


In My Dreams We're Still Screaming

by SnapbackThriller



Series: Becca Kaspbrak [2]
Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Clown Fighting, Coming of Age, Computer Programming, Eddies Kid Being an Asshole, Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Movie: IT Chapter Two (2019), Original Character(s), Pennywise (IT) Being an Asshole, Road Trips, Sequel, Teenagers Scaring the Living Shit Out Of Me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-21
Updated: 2020-03-23
Packaged: 2021-02-16 12:48:23
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 32,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21508198
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SnapbackThriller/pseuds/SnapbackThriller
Summary: Eddie and Richie find themselves being called back to Derry in order to help fight the clown...Naturally, Becca Kaspbrak thinks that they're both complete fucking idiots with no sense of self-preservation, so she decides to take matters into her own hands...(SEQUEL TO WHICH TO BURY, US OR THE HATCHET, AND THERE ARE A LOT OF REFERENCES TO THAT, SO A LOT THIS FIC PROBABLY WON'T MAKE ANY SENSE IF YOU HAVEN'T READ IT. IT'S ALSO NOT VERY REDDIE-CENTRIC AND IS RATHER MORE ABOUT EDDIE'S DAUGHTER, SO IF REDDIE IS PURELY WHAT YOU'RE LOOKING FOR THIS FIC MIGHT NOT BE FOR YOU, PLEASE AND THANK YOU)
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier, Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Series: Becca Kaspbrak [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1550266
Comments: 28
Kudos: 65





	1. Grab You're Mother's Keys, We're Leaving...

**Author's Note:**

> Ok Loser's I'm back. Sorry the wait took so long, I enjoyed a nice mojito and a vacation after finishing the first fic. Took some time writing the first chapter for this one. I know everyone's in celebration mode now that the movie's out (or rather depression mode because the unused death scene got released, and wow its somehow worse and I'm like... not having a good time) so I figure now's the best time to post. Going to try to post weekly, but don't be surprised if its a few days late (its finals month so I'll be busy af). Also I'm excited af about this fic, because tbh I've secretly craved the fan theory that Gen Z kids would be funny as fuck to watch fight Pennywise (especially from the 2016 era) and since nobody's feeding me what I want, I'm bouncing off my last fic and just feeding myself the content I crave. 
> 
> ANYWAYS, I MISSED YOU ALL AND I HOPE YOU ENJOY!

Five years left a lot of room for change in life, and boy had Becca changed a lot since the night of the comedy club. To start, she’d finally grown into her weight, and her hair was finally long enough to where it no longer reminded her of her mom. She wore darker clothes now, and was at the tail end of her current emo-phase, but to _really_ get into the thick of it, she was _actually fucking seventeen_ now, which nearly gave Eddie a small heartattack at the realization that his daughter was nearly a fucking adult. She remembered Richie being thrilled for her though, talking about how seventeen is the best years of life because that’s the age of your senior year, and senior years were the best because you took way less classes and you had a shit ton of added free time. Becca felt inclined to agree with that.

She did not, however, agree that her senior year was the best time of her life. Because to be honest, the shit was uneventful and frightening as fuck. It was mainly a lot of her and her friends dicking off, smoking weed, being rowdy and unkempt teenagers who terrorized the city of LA. However, it was also LA, so they weren’t exactly anything special.

She did however, think fondly of her senior year for one specific reason, and that reason was her friends. 

James, Martin, Mendy, Diana and Karmen: they had all dedicated their senior year to each other as their last year before going their separate ways. 

It wasn’t what they wanted, but they knew it would happen. Everyone had different dreams and aspirations. Diana and Karmen were talking about moving to Salem, Michigan together because they loved the city and enjoyed ghost hunting on the downlow; plus, Karmen’s family had moved from there and she still had extended family in that city (turns out being into the supernatural and weird just ran in Karmen’s family). Neither of them were particularly interested in college, so they both just figured they’d get an apartment and figure the rest out along the way. Mendy had applied to CalArts, which to be honest was a bit of an expensive pipedream, but Mendy was certain it’d be worth the risk, and Becca would be damned if she’d try to stop her.

Mendy was a late bloomer in the group, having started hanging out with them their freshman year of highschool, but she’d quickly become a loved member within the ranks; having joined their group after Becca had seen her drawing in their English class and questioned her about being their concept artist. Mendy had short curly hair with too many freckles to count, hiding her eyes behind thick hipster glasses, and such a quiet attitude that most people in the school would forget that she existed, but Becca knew. It almost made her feel protective all things considered. In her eyes, Mendy was the sweetest and deserved all the attention in the world, but Mendy liked things as they were, and as much as Becca wanted to get her out of her shell, she could always respect that.

She was also shorter than Becca (shockingly), so obviously she had pushed for her to be around more often in hopes that she’d no longer be deemed the smallest. Somewhat evil? Yes. Worth it? Absolutely.

Martin had gotten accepted into Berkley, which he was thrilled about considering his degree of choice was political science. Becca remembered everyone freaking out when he’d received his acceptance letter, all of them hugging him profusely, yelling about how he’d be the best, most soulless politician of all time. It had been a fantastic fucking day (despite the slight sadness oozing off of Martin that he and Mendy would be going seperate ways, since he was incapable of hiding a crush), and they managed to still have fun even despite the fact that they’d all gotten drunk and cried for hours after the celebration; the realization finally hitting that everyone would be going seperate ways.

James on the other hand was planning to go to UCLA for the same thing that Becca wanted to go for; computer science. In fact, their entire friend groups existence revolved around their devoted interest in game design and their shitty fucking homemade video game, so obviously it was what they both wanted to go to college for as the ringleaders (and programmers) behind the entire operation.

James and Becca had always stuck to the programming side of things, designing the code, actually building the game itself. Diana was a writer, and while she typically wrote small novels (and fanfic) just for fun, she would work together with Karmen to come up with the plot for the game, helping with characters and world lore, and all the stuff that was needed for the game to exist. After that, Mendy always worked as the artist while Martin just had a tendency to be their cheerleader/game-tester, playing the actual game itself and giving feedback to the group so that adjustments could be made. He’d joked it was because he had no actual talent, so this was his contribution to the collective. They always joked back that he was right.

God, Becca didn’t know what would happen when she lost this. 

She secretly wanted everyone to stay in LA. Or for everyone to pick a location and go somewhere together. She thought about asking for everyone to just move to Berkely with Martin. After all Becca and James could get a computer science degree there, and Berkely did have art programs, but it was a losing battle. Mendy had her heart set on CalArts, and deep down Becca knew that. Along with that, Diana wanted to move to Salem as inspiration for her current supernatural novel she’d been working on, and obviously Karmen would follow her anywhere (since they were the world’s cutest lesbian couple of all time, and they’d never leave eachother). Lastly there was Jame’s, and his biggest reason for not moving to Berkely with Martin wound up boiling down to not wanting to piss off his mom, who was completely opposed to the idea of James's going anywhere further than an hour drive.

So here were the playing cards, and then there was Becca, an ace card who was not even sure what the fuck she wanted to even do.

“Bec, you know it’s ok to not have all the chess pieces lined up right now, right? You’re just seventeen, did you know I changed degrees three times before I realized I hated college and just dropped out” Richie had told her, which was a vastly different speech than her father had given.

“Please just don’t go to college in Maine or Florida, or I swear to god, I will not visit you” he said, which at the time had made her laugh, but in retrospect really didn’t help her at all.

She knew she loved coding and game design. She had some schools picked out, and she ironically enough (despite her dad’s anti-Florida speech) even had her own dreams that were dragging her away from her friends. She’d been extremely interested in Full Sail, and had even forced Richie to take her there during their trip to Orlando to let her see the school. Eddie had pitched a fit at the idea, not because of the distance from California, but specifically because he absolutely hated Florida.

“All I’m saying is that all the weirdest shit you read about in articles? All Florida. Plus there are alligators and the fucking _humidity_ , which just all adds to the shitstain that is that state”.

She really wanted to go for it, the issue was that she didn’t want to go for it alone. While she understood realistically that her friends wouldn’t all stick around forever, she wanted to stick to at least one. Just so she had _someone_. She didn’t think she was ready to let them all go yet. She figured it was selfish, but she didn’t think she’d ever be ready.

In the summer of 2016 however, all of those thoughts and concerns which seemed so important at the time got tossed out of the window when her dads got the call.

Ben and Beverly had called them both to tell them that the clown was back. The clown that Becca remembered intimately from the vivid descriptions she’d heard from her father and Richie. The clown that nearly killed both her dads, and her aunt and uncles (her dad’s old friends that lovingly called themselves the ‘Loser’s’). 

She remembered the moment they got the call in slow motion. They’d all been watching movies on the couch when Eddie stepped into the other room, quickly followed by Richie. Becca did what she always did in these situations. She eavesdropped. She remembered walking in front of their room and listening to Richie panicking. Their whispered voices going up a few octaves from the fear. Eventually she got caught for eavesdropping through when Richie exited their room to slam into the bathroom, where only seconds later she could hear him vomiting into the toilet after throwing himself onto the floor.

“Becca, how long have you been listening…” Eddie had whispered, and Becca just shrugged, feigning innocence as Eddie just sighed, walking up to her and pulling her back into the living room. 

“So IT’s back isn’t it” Becca asked, and Eddie just exhaled sharply as he nodded and Becca nodded with him “when do we leave?”

“No, its when we Richie and I leave, you are staying right here” Eddie said to her firmly, and immediately Becca glared at him, anger etched all over her face “BULLSHIT YOUR LEAVING ME, WHAT IF SOMETHING HAPPENS TO YOU-”

“Oh yeah Bec? Your gonna pull that, no the _better_ question is _IF_ I took you, what would _I_ do if something were to happen to _you_ Bec” Eddie said it with no ounce of sarcasm and no swearing, which immediately made Becca realize he was not joking around and fully intended to follow this stupid idea through. Becca just shook her head at him in disbelief as Eddie pushed past her and into the bathroom, rubbing Richie’s back as he spit into the toilet.

“Dad, you _know_ I’ve been preparing for this, I even have a _notebook_ and a goddamn _list_ of potential ideas for taking out your clown, you _KNOW_ that I’ve wanted to go with you on the off chance that you were both forced to go back. How can I make sure you guys are ok if _I’M NOT THERE-_ ”

“BECCA, YOU ARE _NOT_ COMING TO DERRY, SO STOP PUSHING THE FUCKING SUBJECT, I’LL TAKE YOUR STUPID NOTEBOOK IF YOU WANT, I’LL CALL YOU EVERY HOUR, WE WILL BE AS CAREFUL AS WE CAN BE, BUT BEC, YOU. ARE. _NOT_ GOING” Eddie yelled at her, and Becca just stared at him with a defeated expression,mouth hanging open and feeling all of her anger boiling silently inside of her as she looked away from him with tears welling up in her eyes. Eddie hated himself for making her cry, but he knew he had no other choices. There was no way he was letting his daughter anywhere near that fucking clown. He couldn’t even fathom the idea of it.

“Bec, you know he’s right… you can’t sweetheart, I’m sorry, this isn’t your burden” Richie said softly, now standing by the sink when Bec finally turned to look back at them, watching as Richie threw listerine into his mouth in a desperate attempt to quit tasting the aftermath of his phone call as Eddie built on where Richie left off, arms crossed in a tense stance “look, we don’t even want to go back, but we have to... all the Loser’s have to, but you _don’t_ , so even though we have to kill the clown or-” 

Eddie cut off as his phone was ringing again, and Richie let out a soft “fuck” as he made his way to it, noticing that the caller ID was for Stan.

“Hold on, its- shit... he must have gotten the news; Richie talk sense into Becca please” Eddie practically growled out the words, clearly already done with the conversation as Richie let out a long sigh, stepping towards where Becca leaned against the wall in the hallway, arms crossed and angry. If circumstances were lighter, he would have teased her about how she looked just like she had at the gas station throwing a fit all those years ago at the age of twelve, but situations weren’t light, and this wasn’t her being mad as a joke, this was her actually fucking _pissed._

“Becca…”

“Fuck off” she spat out, glaring at him “I don’t have to be in the thick of it, and I can respect you not wanting me near the clown, but do you really think I’ll be better off here at this house for the next few days? Just silently sitting in the living room with a thumb up my ass, waiting to know if you survived? I want to help, I _CAN_ help, just give me a chance-”

“No” Richie said to her simply. His voice didn’t get testy though like Eddie’s, he was deadpan serious as he said it, and that somehow hit her harder, causing her rage to respike.

“THAT IS SUCH _BULLSHIT_ , YOU CAN’T JUST TELL ME _NO_ ” she shrieked and Richie’s expression hardened somewhat as he tried to push his point across.

“Becca, think of it this way. We need to kill this clown, or we could potentially die, right? That’s the whole gig. It’s what Beverly told us would happen if we fail. And if your there with us, and the clown starts to fuck with you? Becca, we wouldn’t be able to concentrate on killing the fucking thing if we have to worry every waking moment that you could be stuck being tormented by IT, or worse, being fucking _killed_ by IT” Richie didn’t yell like Eddie did, but the tone of his voice almost felt the exact same as when Eddie yelled. She knew she was crying now out of anger, feeling the wetness moving down her cheeks, and she wanted to scream on top of a hill or hit something or-

“Richie, I fucking need you to talk to Stan man, he’s…” Eddie trailed off as he looked at Becca still in the hallway, still furious as all hell and glaring at him “look, just get in here, it’s important”.

“Did something happen to Uncle Stan” Becca questioned, her anger still evident but she tried to speak calmly as she asked, because it was about _Stan_. As Eddie handed the phone off to Richie, who proceeded to walk into their bedroom and close the door, leaving Eddie and Becca alone.

“Nothing happened to Stan, he’s… I’ll tell you later. Give me your car keys though-”

“WHAT, FUCK NO-”

“Becca, I know you have google maps on your phone and im not a fucking idiot. I’m not gonna have you following us to Maine, and it's summer so you don’t have any school to go to, and you already quit your part-time job for college, so I _know_ you don’t need them. Give me your keys” Becca stared at him in defeat, so furious she didn’t even have words to say. She dug out her keys slowly from her thick black jacket (one of Richie’s old ones that she’d decided to repurpose), not even handing the keys to Eddie and instead throwing them down the hallway and onto the floor as Eddie just turned to look at the keys and then back at her with a dry expression and a “wow, very mature”.

“Fuck you” Becca muttered, and it kind of got to Eddie a bit, because this wasn’t her normal ‘fuck you’ where she didn’t mean it, or she kind of did did but she didn’t mean it harmfully. This was serious and _she fully meant it_... and Eddie felt his expression fall somewhat, but quickly tried to harden it again so that she wouldn’t find a crack in the wall.

“Consider this your grounding then for saying that to me, because _I don’t have time for this_. You’re Uncle is mid-crisis right now, and I need to deal with that. I don’t have time to deal with you too. We’re leaving tomorrow morning” he told her, pushing past her and into his and Richie’s room with her keys in his hand. She just stood there for god knows how long before she decided to crouch next to the door and listen to what they were saying, tears still running down her cheeks but she was calmer now. More focused.

“I can’t believe he wanted to fucking kill himself, that _stupid fucking idiot_ -”

“He’s just scared Rich, he promised us he wouldn't-”

“I know but-”

Becca pulled away from the door and launched herself onto her feet, feeling her chest rise and fall in panic because she knew they were talking about Uncle Stan, and she put a hand over her mouth at the realization that he had wanted to _commit suicide_ just to avoid confrontation with that clown.

That was it. Fuck that. She’d get to Derry if she had to take a fucking bus. Even if she had to walk.

Unfortunately though, she realized quickly that bus tickets were expensive, and walking wasn’t viable. Looking into her debit account which currently only had sixty dollars, she knew she wouldn’t have enough for any form of transportation. Hitchhiking was an idea, but she figured that was less successful than the movies made it out to be.

Then she went to her next plan. It wasn’t the choice she wanted, because she didn’t want them to be involved, but she knew it was the only choice she had.

She ran into her room and shut the door, quickly grabbing her old shirts from her laundry basket and pushing it partially into the door crack to keep Eddie and Richie from hearing. She knew once they were done discussing Uncle Stan they’d be back to talk to her. She also knew they’d be very suspicious of her and she only had one shot at this.

She turned on her playstation quietly, pulling her mic on and muting her TV so that they couldn’t hear. She saw James and Martin were online and quickly texted them for a party invite, which she got only a few seconds later.

“Beccy Boooo, a big ‘what’s up’ to my favorite Trashmouth, you trying to join our game” James said with all his typical bravado, and normally she’d say something sarcastic about him calling her that but she knew she didn’t have time.

“I can’t stay online, I can’t text you details right now because my dads might check my phone, I’m gonna text you at two this morning because their old as dirt and they won’t be awake but I need to know if your even ok with this first… my dads are going to do something really stupid and they took my keys so I couldn’t follow them, but J, I know you have a car and a license, so I wondered if we could take your car to follow after and help them and... would you guys be willing to roadtrip with me to Maine so we can make sure they don’t die?”

She felt her heart drop as the party’s voice chat went dead, and nobody spoke for at least a minute until finally Martin’s voice popped in.

“Um, is this about that clown thing” she groaned internally at Martin’s tone, and probably would have externally done it if the risk of her parents hearing weren’t there.

“Yes Martin, it's about that clown thing” she growled quietly into the mic, and she heard James laughing in the background in response.

“That fucking clown that nearly killed your parents that you talk about? The one that gave them memory problems? I still don’t think that thing is real, like… it's like when my mom lied to me about Santa Clause, or when Martin’s mom lied to him about his dad coming back-”

“We don’t talk about that piece of shit in this group chat-”

“Sorry Marty, anyway my point is that I’m totally on board, because I’m off this weekend, and Marty quit his job for Berkely so he has all the time in the world, and I know you're overreacting about all of this, because no offense but your dad's story is probably bullshit that their using to cover up something else, but ya know… FUCK IT! If it makes you feel better, lets do it, all three of us; and when you realize I was right and your gay dads just wanted to go on vacation to Bora Bora for the summer without you, we can just barhop at whatever shitty capital is in Maine” James said with a triumphant tone, and while Becca was only a little furious at his reaction, because apparantly this had driven her Uncle to suicidal thoughts and he was cracking jokes, she decided not to push the opprotunity away, because he was clearly agreeing despite everything, and she _needed_ a ride.

“Fuck you but fine, Marty can you come?”

“I… can.... but look, are we gonna be in danger? Because you know how I am under pressure… how scared I get” Martin whispered and Becca briefly hated herself that she knew she’d be putting him through this. She had no other options though, and she knew they’d be better as a team. 

However, she couldn’t lie to him.

“If I’m right, and my dads aren’t lying like James seems to think then… yes, we’d be in a lot of danger Marty” the response came out whispered, and she nervously waited for a response just to hear Martin take a shaky breath in, clearly trying to push back the panic.

“I’ll go…” he finally whispered, and Becca let out a relieved sigh as she closed her eyes and thanked whatever God was up there “I’ll only go though because I don’t want you to get hurt” she felt her eyes welling up.

“I… Jesus… thank you Marty, I- you don’t know what that means to me, I won’t let anything happen to you, I promise... I’ll text you all in the group chat at exactly two in the morning, please be on and I’ll text you all the details, and be prepared to leave tomorrow. We’ll get set up on how this is going to go down, ok?”

“You got it chief, operation ‘Save The Gays’ is officially underway” James said into the mic, and Becca scowled at him but decided not to comment.

“I’ll talk to you soon… thank you for this, I love you both… bye” she whispered, ending the call on her playstation and hearing her door knock not a second later.

“Becca?”

It was Richie, she knew. Her dad was probably still pissed at her so she wasn’t shocked it wasn’t him.

“Bec, look, can I come in please” she heard a thud on her doorframe and knew it had to have been Richie pressing his massive fucking forehead into her door in hopes that she’ll open it, or that she’ll answer. She exhaled slowly as she threw the mic off of her head and buried it under the laundry lying on her floor, turning off her playstation and TV so that Richie wouldn’t see before shouting a quick “come in…”.

Richie opened the door and stared at her, holding a bag of doritos in one hand (a small thing that he does when he wants her to feel better) and giving her a sad smile which made her want to cry again.

“Hey kiddo” he said with a hopeful grin as he walked down to where she was sitting on the floor, proceeding to sit down next to her and handing her the bag of doritos.

“You put a clip on these right, because if you didn’t and their stale, I’m not gonna fucking eat them, and your bribe won’t work” Richie laughed softly at that.

“Jesus you really are Eddie’s kid. Sometimes I think you guys are so different but when the moments come out, they _reeally_ come out” Richie’s smile dropped as he spoke, now fully frowning again and staring off at the dresser before continuing, unable to hold her attention as she glared ahead and ate her doritos silently.

“Look Bec, I know your mad, and I know that the anger isn’t gonna go away because we’re benching you and your clearly pissed-”

“Damn fucking right-”

“But we’re doing this because we love you, ok? And we do mean it when we say that this fucking clown shit Bec? It’s not something that we ever want you having to live through, it was… Bec, I’d never been so scared in my life-”

“Which is exactly why I don’t want you two with your two shared collective brain cells going alone, because do you really think I want you to feel like that again? You two are self-sacrificial and common-sense stupid, you’ll get yourselves killed,” she muttered and Richie just sighed as he put an arm around her, ruffling her hair as he tried to be reassuring.

“Bec sweetie, we’re adults ok; old as dirt adults who pay taxes and cry watching Titanic, as you never fail to remind us. We’ll be fine, we can take care of ourselves and WOW, two whole collective brain cells; glad to know you have so much unadulterated confidence in our abilities” Richie giggled a little and Bec (despite herself) smiled a little too “but my point Becca is if we’re worrying that your ok constantly, or where you are or if the clown is messing with you, we’ll fucking freak out and we can’t focus on taking IT out, but Pennywise doesn’t know about you ok, and since you’ve never been to Derry, he hopefully never will, so he can’t use you against us if he doesn’t know-”

Becca hadn’t thought of it like that. She really hadn’t, and she felt a little more guilty at the thought that going back might make things worse for them but…

She wasn’t changing her mind. It just meant that precautions had to be taken.

“And I know you're mad right now, but we promise, your dad and I are gonna do everything in our power to get back to you, we won’t take any unnecessary risks” she scoffed at this, shaking her head.

“Did Stan try to kill himself?”

Richie felt his heart stammer as his reassuring expression fell, a nervous expression breaking into his features as he fumbled to readjust his glasses.

“Uh, what-”

“It’s a simple question. I heard you two in there. You said ‘You couldn’t believe he wanted to kill himself’ I heard you so don’t lie” Becca was finally making that direct eye contact Richie had been seeking earlier, and he regretted searching for it now when it was _this_. Despite being the adult, Richie still felt himself shrink a little under her gaze. She always got intense when she really cared.

“He… he wanted to but he didn’t try. He called us as soon as the compulsion to do it took over… he seemed to think that he’d be putting us at risk by going back but… I’m glad he called us, because otherwise…” Richie shook his head, not even wanting to comprehend that thought, but he didn’t want to freak out Becca, so he played it casual “I don’t know, it might have been fine, but he’s ok now, he’s coming to Maine with us, and we managed to talk him down, he’s just… he’s scared”.

In that moment, hearing those words and what Stan had nearly done, she decided she couldn’t _not_ do it. Any creeping doubts about Pennywise using her against the Loser’s, or her friends being at risk (as selfish as it was) came secondary to the fact that this clown had nearly killed her fucking Uncle tonight using nothing but sheer nervous fear and old trauma, and ‘IT’ HAD to fucking go. She wanted to do it personally. She wanted to make sure it was dead.

But to do that she needed to play the game so…

She’d play.

“I’ll stay Richie… I’m sorry I was acting like a bitch, I don’t- I don’t want to make things harder on you-”

Richie seemed to smile again. It was a sad smile and she hated it and wanted it wiped off his face. But she needed to kill the clown to do that and it just reassured her more.

“Sweetie, your not a bitch, you just… you care a lot. And, I want you to know how brave it is that you wanted to come, even if we can’t let you do it. You’re so brave, we’re sitting here scared shitless and your begging us to come like you could take IT on all by yourself. You’re much braver than us and that’s just… we couldn’t be more proud of you Becca” she felt her throat constrict with guilt. None of this was bravery. It was more like selfish revenge. Her being unable to go a day in her life without trying to control everything going on around her. For a second, she worried that this was the same mentality that drove her mother crazy. She worried they were too similar. She worried she was becoming her. 

But her desire to keep her dads safe and to kill that piece of shit ‘Pennywise’ kept her face blank and her brain in check.

She kept her poker face on and played along.

“Thanks… I try to be, you both make me braver” she whispered, and Richie scoffed lightly as he smiled fondly at her, giving her a quick peck on the forehead before pulling her into his chest in a hug, whispering “nah sweetheart, it’s all you, you’re the bravest kid I know”.

She decided that those were the words that would empower her to do this.

She, Martin and James were gonna do whatever it took to wipe this fucking demon off the face of the Earth.

If the power of belief was what it took, she believed that she’d do anything to protect her dads, even kill an evil demon clown. 

So that’s what she was going to do.

“I’ll stay behind, I promise… I’ll stay behind” she whispered softly into Richie’s shoulder as she hugged him back, listening as he exhaled in relief, holding her tightly in the hug and whispering that he loved her.

She was a liar though.

She’d be dead before she stayed behind.

Richie eventually left her room to check on Eddie. She normally loved when she and Richie hung out, but currently she was desperate for him to leave, because as soon as her door shut and Richie had walked outside, she was pulling out her planner and writing down her scheme.

Pennywise couldn’t know who she was. So she had to play this cool. The minute they get to Maine, she’d make sure her friends would only call her by her first name. No last names at all. If IT didn’t know her last name was Kaspbrak, then IT couldn’t use her against her parents. 

She’d leave her actual driver's license here, but decided to take her fake ID just in case it was required. It didn’t have her real name on it, so it couldn’t give anything away.

Along with that, she was sure her dad was paranoid enough to check and see if she was home. She knew he’d never resort to something like this under normal circumstances but in his eyes, this was his daughter's life in the matter, so he wouldn’t hesitate to call the phone company and ask about her location, so having her phone was out the window. 

She decided that she’d leave her phone here on charge at the house so that it wouldn’t die, and if Eddie called the company he could see she was at the house. She knew her dad would call to check up, and she also knew she’d get away with not answering if her dad thought she was still pissed; not answering out of spite. She’d just have to keep up the persona of anger so that her dad wouldn’t question it when she didn’t answer.

Richie on the other hand would be harder to trick. If she didn’t answer Eddie she was sure she’d get a phone call from Rich. She’d already dropped the ball with Richie by hugging him and convincing him she’d stay behind by ‘apologizing’, and she could only hope that they’d be too busy in Derry to throw a fit about her not picking up the phone.

She’d thought it all through. Her entire plan. She’d be their guardian angel, following after to make sure they didn’t do something stupid. She’d have Marty and J hiding in their car around the block, and as soon as Richie and Eddie left, she’d run over to their car and follow. 

It was a genius scheme. 

Once her alarm clock said it was a little past one, she started packing her duffel bag. She threw in her taser, her baseball bat from her failed attempt at joining the softball team and… she stopped and stared at her knife, the one she never did give back to Richie.

She stuffed them all into the bag and quietly made her way to her door, opening it slowly as she tip-toed her way down the hall to the side closet. She spent a grand total of ten seconds slowly opening it up to ensure it didn’t squeak, and once it was wide enough for her to reach in, she grabbed the nail box and the hammer out of the tool bag on the shelf and slowly repeated the process all over again as she attempted to once more close the door back up without noise.

She walked the box of nails and her hammer back into her room and never felt more grateful for the fact that her parents were the deepest fucking sleepers. 

She pulled the bat back out and slowly began to hammer in the nails. She’d seen them do this in Stranger Things and figured it wasn’t a bad plan. She worked quietly, ensuring that she hammered slowly enough that no noise would leave the room. It was a long process, but as it neared two in the morning, she knew it was worth it as she observed the spiked bat.

She placed it carefully back in her bag and put her hands together in thought as she heard her phone vibrate, making her way over to it and laying down on her bed as she scrolled down to the new message.

_Hey Beccy, I wanted to say this outside of the groupchat. I’m sorry for what I said. I still can’t say I believe that what your dad’s said is true, but I shouldn’t have been making jokes when your clearly worried so… sorry for being a dick._

It was from James, and she let out a huff of breath through her nose as she rolled her eyes somewhat. 

_Don’t apologize for conforming to your natural state of being. People don’t get mad at bears for mauling people because it's just what they do._

Now, she knew that this looked passive aggressive, but she swore she had meant it in jest. Unfortunately though, it was the kind of text that really didn’t sound like joking material. Maybe if she’d included an emoji…

_Is that really what you think of me?_

She stared at his response and she kind of hated herself. Hated how defensive she gets. Didn’t know what had pushed her to write such a rude text. Normally Jame’s could handle her joking, overly aggressive attitude but she had a terrible time reading when that was appropriate and when it wasn’t.

_No J. I don’t think that of you. I was being mean. It’s ok though about earlier, I forgive you. I wouldn’t believe me either._

She had one last text she needed to send before she dedicated fully to informing the group chat of the plan. While she waited on Jame’s to respond, she pulled up Stan’s phone number and quickly started typing her text to him.

_Hi Uncle Stan, I heard what happened. Please don’t do it. I know you’re scared and I know how hard the situation must be, but I promise you that no one would be better off without you. They need you._

She sent the text and exhaled before sending a follow up text.

_I need you too. I love you. Please be safe. I wish I could be there with you._

She didn’t expect to see a response. It was so late, and she’d be abandoning her phone first thing in the morning. So when her phone buzzed and it wasn’t Jame’s, she was caught off guard.

_I won’t. I promise. I don’t wish you were there with me, because I don’t want you near that thing, but I appreciate the sentiment Beccy. I love you too. If something were to happen, just know that I love you._

That text fucking broke her. But she was determined not to cry. She felt the tears well up and she pushed them back as she texted him one last time.

_Nothings gonna happen to you Stan, and you better quit thinking like that or I’ll fly to Atlanta right now and beat the fucking shit out of you._

She could almost hear Stan’s laughter in the back of her head, and she hoped that the joke would distract from her silent promise. Because nothing _would_ happen to Stan. 

She wasn’t gonna let it happen.

_Well with threats like that, how can I say no. I guess I’ll leave you with a ‘until next time’ then, more tasteful?_

She grinned as her vision blurred from the tears. It was a couple minutes past two. She needed to join the group chat, but she had to wrap this up.

_Until next time Stan, please be brave, the Loser’s won’t let anything bad happen to you._

She had to silently think ‘and I won’t either’, because if she gave herself away then all of this was for nothing.

_I know. I love you._

She smiled and typed her final message to him.

_I love you too.. kick the clown in the dick for me >:D _

She then closed out of the chat with Stan to pull up her friends, looking at the collection of texts already accumulated.

_Becca, what the fuck is the plan here man? - Martin_

_Yeah, are we dueling? Are we about to fight hillbilly trash in the streets of Maine? What should we be expecting? - James_

She decided the best answer was to pick up her phone and snap a picture of her weapon collection in her duffel bag, showing the full view of the hammer and the nailed up bat, along with her taser and her knife.

They could call her a lot of things, but they couldn’t say she was a bad planner.

_Jesus christ we’re gonna die aren’t we… - Martin_

_WELL WITH THAT ATTITUDE YOU ARE BITCH! Oh, and Bec, I’m adding Diana, Karmen and Mendy to the group chat, they wanna come too :D - James_

Before Becca could even tell him not to she was receiving texts from them.

_I heard we’re killing a clown? - Diana_

_I HOPE we’re killing a clown, what a fucking cool senior moment to add to the reel, I’m working on a playlist :P - Mendy_

_Bec, can we come? I know you didn’t invite us but we’re all best friends right? You can’t NOT take us - Karmen_

Becca didn’t know about Diana or Mendy, but she did know that Karmen believed her. She was a real woodsy pagan type, and while it wasn’t Becca’s thing, she loved that about Karmen. She believed in bad spirits and evil entities; I mean hell, she was the one who insisted on burning sage inside the new house that Richie and Eddie had finally moved them into. So when Becca finally trusted the group enough to tell them about what her dad’s had survived, Karmen was pretty much the only one to fully believe her.

There was a reason Diana got so into supernatural stuff, and it wasn’t natural inspiration.

_I didn’t invite you all because I didn’t want any of you to get hurt. This shit is gonna be dangerous, and I know not all of you believe me, but I promise you it is. I would never tell you guys you can’t come, but I feel like it's only fair that you know what your getting into. This isn’t a ‘fun senior trip’. We could legitimately die. - Becca_

The texts dropped for a few minutes and Becca understood. It was heavy. There was a lot to process. She knew that. She could only hope they believed her enough to know that there would be risks.

_Fuck it, whats a good senior year without a few life-threatening adventures, it’ll be like a bonding experience, like in Fight Club when they burn their hands together and vibe - Diana_

_Diana honey, bad example, but it’s all the more reason to come with you Beccy, we can’t let you guys do this alone, it’s not fair to you. If something were to happen to you and you actually got hurt or died, we’d hate ourselves for the rest of our lives knowing that we might have been able to be there and stop it. It’s already decided. We’re coming. - Karmen_

_I’ve analyzed the risks, I get your words Bec, but I’m letting you know right now, I’m still coming, because I spent way too long making this fucking playlist on spotify, and I’ll be damned if I’m not fighting clowns to it. I’m legitimately naming it the ‘fighting clowns playlist’. - Mendy_

Becca let out a slow breath as she absorbed this. They were coming, it was decided. It was probably for the best. All of them had always been better as a team anyway.

_Ok. We leave tomorrow. I don’t know when we’ll be back. Be prepared for that. If you have anything that can be used as a weapon, bring it. I love them, but my family’s so stupid they’ll probably just storm in emptyhanded anyway. They're all complete disasters like that. I’m gonna break down the plan. - Becca_

She sent a map of Derry that she’d circled and highlighted into the groupchat.

_Derry’s not a big town, but I’d rather keep eyes on my parents and aunt and uncles as often as humanly possible. We have GPS’s if we can’t effectively tail them, but if we CAN tail them that’s preferred. So here’s the plan. James will be parked around the block so my dads cant see him when they leave. MAKE SURE YOU HAVE A FULL TANK OF GAS ASSHOLE, I KNOW YOU BELIEVE IM BEING AN INSANE PERSON RIGHT NOW BUT PLEASE JUST FUCKING HUMOR ME OK? As soon as they leave I run over to you guys and we follow them out. They don’t know what your car looks like so as long as we stay a distance back from them in our car, they shouldn’t notice we’re tailing them. Besides, they’re oblivious, they didn’t even know they had feelings for each other for weeks before they started dating. They needed someone else to talk sense into them; AKA ME, so I know for a fact they’re slightly braindead._

She thought it was genius until Mendy broke her vibe.

_Ummm Beccy, a cog in your plan sweetie, uh… you have looked at a US map before right? - Mendy_

It was at this moment that Becca realized she was a moron. 

_Yeah Beccy, Maine is like… you realize that’s a two day drive, 3,000 mile excursion right? You’re dads are probably gonna just fly there. - Karmen_

Fuck, she hadn’t thought of that. She figured it would be a days drive tops.

_It’s a 12 to 18 hour flight from the looks of it, I think that if we left now we could get there closer to the same time as them but I’m pretty sure that's gonna throw a wrench in your ‘tailing them’ plan. So what’s your thoughts? - Martin_

She pushed her hand in her hair. To be honest, the tailing thing she could work around. Again, Derry was a small town, and she was certain that she could find them through the process of elimination. Again, they were walking disasters, it wouldn’t be too hard to do.

What she _was_ worried about though was how she could leave right now without alerting her dads as to what she was doing. She knew that they thought she was mad at them. She was originally gonna use that anyway so that her dad wouldn’t get suspicious. She decided she’d just use that now instead.

_Then we’re leaving now. We don’t need to tail them. Everybody meet me at Jame’s house in thirty minutes. - Becca_

Her dad’s would still beat her there, she knew that. But this way it would only be by about thirty six hours. Maybe more if their flights have delays. So roughly between thirty six to twenty four hours of a head start. She could only pray they didn’t get themselves killed in that time.

She picked up her charger and her phone, zipping up the duffel bag of weapons and throwing it over her shoulder as she quickly opening her door, walking quietly into the living room. She opened the front door slowly so that they wouldn’t hear her and quickly walked out of the front door as she hid her weapon bag in the bushes of the front lawn. She didn’t want them seeing them and figuring out what she was getting into. 

She walked back inside, closing the door slowly and walking a little louder now back to Richie and Eddie’s room, knocking and hearing them shuffle inside before hearing the footsteps approach the door. She had to keep her poker face up. One kink in this plan and it would all be fucked. 

And then the door cracked open.

“Beccy…” she heard Richie’s tired voice whisper as she looked up at him standing in the doorway. She had her purse slung over her jacket and her hair pulled back in a loose ponytail as she was let into the room, looking up at her dad who’s hair was in disarray from having just been woken up. 

And it was in this moment, staring at her dad that the thought popped into her head that this could be their last conversation… ever. Obviously she was doing this so she could help keep them safe, but the more her head spun the more she realized that if something were to happen to her, the last memory her dad would have of her would be this moment. This fight. And she really didn’t want that.

To make matters worse, she’d already reconciled with Richie, and they both looked so torn up and so tired. She couldn’t make that worse. She wouldn’t. So her ‘get mad, fight and storm out’ plan immediately got chucked into the metaphorical garbage.

She decided to improvise and see where it takes her, and she figured she could get out one last good memory along the way in case anything went south.

“Dad, I’m sorry I was mean to you, I didn’t mean what I said, I just… I’m just scared shitless you guys aren’t gonna come back” she let her actual paranoias leak out. Wanted to play this right. She was being genuine right now, and Eddie could tell because it wasn’t more than a second before her dad was getting up out of bed, flingling the sheets out of his way, and pacing over to her to pull her into a hug.

They were closer to the same height now. She’d been a bit short as a kid but she now stood at a respectable 5’5, which is about average for a girl. Still pretty short though. He wrapped his arms around her shoulders and just squeezed and she felt tears running down her eyes as she held him back, squeezing tighter if it was at all possible. 

“I know honey, I’m so sorry I got so harsh with you, I hated doing it, I just… I can’t let anything happen to you, you know that” he was crying now too, she could feel the wetness on the side of her head where he was holding her.

“I know dad” she whispered, tears running down her own eyes. She had come here prepared to lie through her teeth but that was a bust, so she just held him tighter, trying to keep her brain in check.

“I treated you like shit and I’m so fucking sorry, I just… you gotta know how fucking scared I am that I’m gonna lose you and-” she was cut off as she felt more pressure in the hug, realizing that Richie was at her side hugging them both. She laughed through her sobs as she brought her left arm off of Eddie to hold Richie’s arm. She loved them so much. She had to remind herself that this was why she was doing this. Because she loved them. She still couldn’t bring herself to act angry. 

“Becca, I promise you I’m gonna strangle that fucking clown myself to get back to you” Eddie whispered, and Becca almost believed him. There was a certain conviction in his voice when he said it. Like when he’d promised her that he’d tell her mom to ‘fuck off’ for her if she couldn’t do it herself (such simpler times). She wanted to believe him the same way she did back then. She trusted him with her life, but she didn’t know if she trusted him with his own.

Accidents happen. I mean, her dad used to be a risk analyst, he knew this better than most. All it takes is one wrong move and her family was gone forever. So while she believed him, she couldn’t trust him. Couldn’t trust the situation. Couldn’t trust that fucking piece of shit clown.

“We’re gonna beat the shit out of it and be home before you know it Bec, I told you, we’re more competent than you think” _they weren’t_ was the first thought that popped into Becca’s head at Richie’s statement, but she just nodded into the hug, knowing they’d notice her agreeing. She wanted them to believe that she believed in them. 

And she did.

Again though, she knew the risks, and letting them do this alone was too much of one for her to take.

They wouldn’t know that though.

“I believe you guys, I just.... I need you alive please, I don’t… I don’t know what I’d do without you both, you have to promise you’ll take care of yourselves” Becca pleaded, and she felt Richie and Eddie nodding at her request, Eddie still crying and Richie just supporting them both.

“We will Becca, we’ll be back before you know it” Richie whispered into the silence of the room, and Becca couldn’t cut away the nagging feeling in her chest that what he was saying was a lie.

“I know” Becca said, pulling back to look at them both and smiling, turning away from Richie to put a hand on his chest and tell him “you know you’re my dad too right?”

She’d rarely ever told Richie that. She never really felt that she needed to. She knew that he knew, and to top it off, calling them both ‘dad’ got confusing. She needed to remind him now though. In case this was her last chance to.

Richie stared at her with his mouth agape and tears building in his eyes. He didn’t have his glasses on so she could see them glistening and she felt like crying too as she smiled at him.

“You’re my dad too Richie, I mean, sure legally you’re my stepdad, but you have always been there for me. You’ve been more of a parent to me than my mom ever was” she told him firmly, making sure he understood, and Richie smiled at her, and she thought she’d never forget that smile. She never could. She was smiling the same.

“Obvously dipshit, you’re my fucking _girl_ Beccy... I fucking love you” he stated firmly, stepping forward and pulling her into a hug, holding her against him tightly and petting her hair in comfort as Becca cried harder. She reached her arms under his and hugged him back, whispering a muffled “I love you too dad” into his shirt. She giggled and pulled back as Richie started ruffling her hair affectionately like he always did. It was something that was distinctly Richie. Her dad never really did that. Or her first dad never really did that.

“I love you both… so fucking much, please come back and protect the others. I… I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you guys, or Uncle Stan or any of the others, I just…” Richie’s hand had since stilled on her head, rather than ruffling he simply let it rest on the top of her head while Eddie put his hand on her shoulder.

“Of course we will…” Eddie told her and she smiled, backing out of the embrace with tears in her eyes. It was now or never.

“Ok… ok I can trust you, I can trust that… Um, I know you’ll both be leaving tomorrow and I don’t want to keep you up all night so… I’m gonna stay at Jame’s while your both gone, because I don’t think I can handle being alone when you leave, so… I know you have my keys, so I’m just gonna walk-”

“Bullshit your gonna walk, its two in the fucking morning Becca, but…” Eddie looked pained as he spoke, looking at Richie and letting out a sigh “Richie can drive you, I still don’t trust you with the car but… I understand you not wanting to be alone so... Richie will take you to your friends house, does that work?”

It worked like a charm for Becca.

She nodded kindly at that, playing along. Though none of it felt like lying, she knew it wasn’t truthful. She hated that but she wanted them safe more.

“Is that ok Rich, if you’re too tired I can do it-”

“Nah Ed’s, go back to sleep, I can do it. It’s only like a ten minute drive from here, I’ll be back in a flash” he grinned, giving Eddie a quick kiss on the lips before grinning wider and kissing his forehead.

“You two are disgusting, I’ll get my stuff and be in the car,” she muttered, shaking her head and walking off towards her room. She grabbed her longest pillow and made a point to walk past their room with it clearly in her arms. It was all part of the half-baked plan she’d come up with. She knew that Richie would take a moment, need to find his glasses. She also knew that if they were taking Richie’s car she was golden because Richie doesn’t lock his fucking car like a complete moron. She walked out the front door, running out with the throw blanket from the living room, and sprinted over to the bushes, grabbing the duffel bag and throwing the blanket over it. 

She took her pillow and walked it towards the side of their house, throwing it into the woods so that her dad wouldn’t suspect if he went back into her room. 

She let out a small, nervous exhale as she moved towards the car, having picked up the duffel bag with the blanket over it, and with her charger wrapped around her neck, phone in hand and both arms wrapped around the duffel bag to hold the blanket that covered it.

It would pass for her pillow.

It’d just look like she’d been carrying her blanket and her pillow and she quickly congratulated herself on her impromptu genius.

She walked to the car and quickly opened the door, sitting in the backseat. 

She watched Richie walking out of the front door. Hands in his jeans pockets and hair a complete rats nest from sleeping. He opened the drivers side and climbed in, letting out a long exhale as he started the car. Becca held her breath.

It just had to work for ten minutes. It had to.

They drove silently for the most part. Becca was too scared to speak and Richie seemed… off. She didn’t know how to describe it. It’s like he was sad. Maybe it was his nerves?

“What’s under the fucking blanket Becca” he whispered, and she felt her heart explode. It was fucked, this was over, he suspected-

“I’m not mad, ok? I know your up to some shit. I can smell it on you from a mile away. If you were really giving up on following us to Derry, you’d have been pouting in your room and throwing a tantrum up until Eddie actually left, not coming in at close to three in the morning to apologize, I’m not fucking stupid, I know you” he whispered, but there was no heat in his words just… it sounded like fear “You’re my kid Becca, of course I fucking know you”.

She had to think that it was ironic. It was the same thing she’d said to Richie all those years ago when he tried to lie to her about the clown, and she’d told him that she wasn’t stupid. It was like poetic justice. A cruel fucking trick. She felt herself beginning to break down, her eyes all glistened from near tears and her hands shaky around the blanketed bag.

“Honey, I’m not mad, I just....” he let out a long sigh and finally pulled the car over and parked it. Sitting for a minute and not turning the car off “Becca, give me the bag”.

“I-I… I’m going… you… you can’t fucking stop me”

“I know”

Becca’s eyes shot up at Richie who was turned around in his seat and looking at her, A defeated expression on his face, and looking way too scared for her liking. She wanted to hit herself for being the cause of that expression.

“You know, your dad and I do a lot to shield you from things, right? Like we tried to do with your mom. I guess we sometimes forget your practically an adult, and to be honest you’re more badass than the two of us combined, and you make your own choices at this point” Richie whispered, pulling the blanket from her hands and letting it fall off of the duffle bag. Richie just looked down at the bag, his mouth slipping into a thin line before continuing “and while I hate this, and I do not want you an inch near Derry... you just said it yourself right, you’re not gonna drop this”.

“I… I just…” she didn’t even know what to say, or where this was going. Richie made eye contact and just smiled at her sadly.

“Eddie would hate me for this,” he whispered grimly, pulling the duffel bag from her arms and opening it up himself, looking at the spiked bat and the other multitude of weapons she’d collected. He chuckled slightly as he saw his old bottle opening knife, plucking it out from the bag and holding it, turning around to grin at Becca “seriously?”

“I… I gotta protect myself from boys or Eddie can’t sleep at night” she said with a small self-deprecating laugh and Richie just rolled his eyes at that, shaking his head and laughing lightly at her joke “yeah, he can't, can he?”

Richie was shaking his head now, a sad smile still molded into his expression before he looked back up at the empty road ahead, placing the knife gently back into the bag.

“I don’t want to know anything, I don’t want to be told anything. I want to have as much blissful ignorance as possible, and if Eddie sees you, your on your own and we never had this conversation, but Becca… do not fucking make me regret this. If we have to protect ourselves, then so do you-”

“I had a plan. I wasn’t gonna let ‘IT’ know I was connected to you all, I just wanted to follow after and make sure you all were ok” Becca whispered, and Richie laughed at that, always the fucking planner. Just like Eddie. Always ten steps ahead of every other person in the room.

“I hope it works… I really want to drive you back home and lock you in the house with bodyguards but....” he lets out a sigh as he puts the car in drive “but you’re relentless and I’d rather us work together than apart… do you have your phone?”

“OG Dad is gonna check its location to make sure I’m in LA, I was gonna leave it behind” Richie nodded at that, pulling the car back into the street “yep, you’re absolutely right, which is why I’m giving you my cellphone”.

“What? You can’t, it's yours-”

“I have a work phone, and I can just tell your dad on the flight that I left it at the house. He’ll call me stupid because he’ll remind me like five times before we leave, but he won’t find it suspicious because… well because I’m me” Richie whispered softly, looking back at her briefly, as Becca nodded dumbly at that. Funny how competent Richie was when he was using his brain.

“I better not see any of you and other dads gross texts on here” she said with a little more bravado, and Richie grinned at that “I knew what you were doing the minute you asked to go to your friends; also, funny that you used to joke that you eavesdrop constantly because while I didn’t intend to eavesdrop on purpose, I could hear you tinkering in the house all night, I knew you were up to something, so I already went ahead and deleted my texts. So in short, no, you won’t be seeing any weird shit on my phone tonight,” he said with a shrug, and Becca just rolled her eyes and shook her head to herself at how much karma was fucking her right now.

“Guess that’s fitting” she said with a shrug, looking at Richie through the front mirror of the car. 

“I’m not kidding Bec, like… at all. I’m doing this because I trust you enough to be smart, and also because I want to make sure your safe, I’m… I’m really putting a lot into you right now, and I just want you to promise me-”

“Dad, I’ll be careful and smart about this, I promise-”

“No, that’s not what I’m asking. Though, it is what I’m asking but not at this current moment. I want you to promise me that you and James, and any of your other little friends; because I know you spend every waking moment with them, and you all do everything together and considering that I’m dropping you off at Jame’s house, I can only assume at the very least he’s going. _Promise me_ that you two, or three, or _whatever_ , will under _no cursimstances_ look for that fucking clown” he stated, looking at her as she let in a shaky breath. They would be looking for that fucking clown. She knew that. Richie probably knew that too. Maybe he just wanted to reassure himself.

“I promise. We’ll be on the sidelines, we won’t actively hunt the clown, I just… I wanna make sure you guys are safe and I can’t sit on the sidelines” she said, and Richie felt himself nodding furiously as he handed her back the duffel bag.

“If you need anything; I don’t care what it is, money, a place, anything, call me. Again, I want to know what you’re doing, and AGAIN, I don’t want you going out of your way to find that clown, and under no circumstances do you let that thing know who you are, do not let it know you’re our kid, can you do that” he asked her seriously, and she put up three fingers as she whispered “scouts honor Richie” and he nodded at her, enough for him to believe at least.

The rest of the drive was eerie as Richie listed off things to remember in case she ran into the clown (which she knew she would, but he didn’t have to know that). 

“If it comes after you, or tries to attack you, just tell yourself it isn’t real, because it isn’t. IT needs you to believe that IT can hurt you to _actually_ hurt you. As long as you aren’t scared and you know it’s fake, IT can’t touch you” Richie said mindlessly as Becca just nodded in understanding at his words “It’ll try and turn into what your most scared of, but since you haven’t lived in Derry, I don’t know to what extent it can know about you-”

“Dad, I get it, I promise. I won’t leave my friends side. We’ll be together consistantly, and if I see the clown, I’ll call it a pussy and tell it to fuck off so I can promptly get the fuck out of dodge, I know the drill” she said to him with a smile, but Richie didn’t look reassured as he pulled into Jame’s lawn, bringing the car to a halt. Becca began to open the passenger's seat and climb out of the car, one hand supporting herself from the climb out by holding onto Richie’s seat before he heard Richie whispering.

“Becca”.

She whipped her head around to look at him, staring at him sharply as Richie put a hand on the one holding the driver's seat, placing his own gently over hers.

“I’m not kidding. Be careful. Call me constantly, and if you see that clown Becca? Fucking leave town and do not come back” he told her, and she gave him a nod as he released her hand, allowing her to push out of the car before whispering “Just be safe sweetie ok… you’re my kid and I love you too much to handle it if something happened to you, just... please be safe.”

She gave him a sad smile as she walked up to the drivers window and knocked for him to roll it down, practically jumping in through the window to hug him and pulling back enough to give him a quick kiss on the cheek.

“Thanks dad” she whispered, and Richie just smiled at her. It wasn’t a happy smile by any means, but it wasn’t sad and that was something.

“Don’t make me regret it. I’m not fucking kidding” Richie whispered, but he looked like he was already regretting it. Becca just gave him a salute as she walked towards Jame’s house with her duffel bag, stepping inside and immediately running into James.

“Hey, you’re here, the others aren’t here yet,” James told her, and Becca just nodded, moving into the living room and muttering a quick “is your mom home?”

“My favorite question for the ladies to ask” he teased, but Becca just gave him a death glare and he quickly changed course, shaking his head and frowning “you know, because my mom is great, and likes to meet my friends, uhhh, no she isn’t home, she’s at her new boyfriend’s house and-”

“Great” she said, opening the duffel bag and spilling the weapons onto the floor.

“Jesus christ, holy shit… is that a fucking bat with nails?”

“I got the idea from the 80’s Netflix show, what weapons did you bring” she asked, and he just stared blankly at her as he backed up and moved into his room, returning with an air dusting spray for his keyboard.

“What a fucking joke, are you serious-”

“Look, I’m sorry, my moms a massive ‘keep dangerous items out of the house’ kinda person, so I didn’t have a lot of choices-”

“You’re mom smokes right, I’m sure she has some lighters around here, grab those” Becca said, pushing her hands into her jacket pocket and looking around the living room for things they could use. She found an old broomstick and decided to use some scissor blades to fashion it into a spear. Anything was better than nothing. James returned about ten minutes later just to stare wide-eyed at the fucking spear his friend was fashioning in the livingroom.

“Bec, don’t you think we’re taking this a bit too far? I mean you already have like a fucking knife and a spiked baseball bat- shit is that a hammer too? What the fuck, do we really need a fucking spear-”

“Look prick, if you don’t want to go and you don’t want to do this just say now and you don’t have to go, but if you _are_ you’re going to fucking _listen to me on this,_ ok? This shit isn’t a joke, I’ve seen firsthand what it's done to my family, and if you don’t believe then fine, but I do, and I’m taking every precaution I can” she was breathing heavily as she finished her speech, and James just stared at her blankly, feeling like a dick again and scratching the back of his head awkwardly.

“Fine, whatever… I got you your lighters” he threw her the bag of his moms lighters, which she caught and held for a minute before looking back up at him “Thanks J…”.

Jame’s gave her a small smile and nodded.

“Anything for the Beccy-Boo, biggest Trashmouth of them all-”

“I thought we agreed that nickname was dumb and we aren’t going to use it” she growled, her eyes narrowing at him in annoyance as he smirked.

“I thought we agreed that I like to annoy you, and there is no faster way to do it than by calling you Trashmouth” he had a nice smile, even if he looked like a bit of a weasel, all skinny and too small for his clothes. His braces still peeking out on his teeth. It never ceased to annoy him that he still needed his braces.

She scowled, shaking her head and rolling her eyes as she shoved past him with the spear, throwing it into the collection. She heard the doorbell ring and quickly turned her head to the side, watching as James looked at her and grinned “it seems somebody’s joined our posse-”

“J, quit fucking quoting Red Dead and open the fucking door man-”

“Jesus, you’re so testy when you’re in fight mode” James grinned, raising his hands up in mock defense as he walked towards the door, opening it to see the whole gang outside, standing right at the doorway before stepping in one by one.

“This is some Lord of the Rings hobbit shit, I want you to know that Becca; are we leaving right now” Diana questioned, arms crossed and staring at her in question. Karmen watched them all quietly, and Mendy bounced on her heels and grinned at Becca, holding up her phone and showing off her playlist excitedly. Becca nodded.

“We’re doing this bitches… we’re gonna go get some McDonalds, put on Mendy’s shitty fucking playlist-”

“EXCUSE YOU BITCH-”

“And then we’re gonna kill this fucking clown”.

  
  



	2. But By The Time The First Bombs Fell We Were Already Bored...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING FOR A SUICIDE REFERENCE THIS CHAPTER
> 
> So I've had a few people ask, so I'm gonna put my own personal 'fancast' for how I envision Becca and her group of friends. This is the list.
> 
> Mendy: Alia Shawkat  
> Karmen: Kiersey Clemons  
> Becca: Beanie Feldstein  
> Martin: Austin Crute  
> James: Freddie Highmore  
> Diana: Chloe Grace Moretz
> 
> And to explain my choice for Becca a bit (I explained it a bit in the comments last chapter but I'll do it again here in case people don't read those), I wanted her to look like Eddie but to also still look like her mom (despite how much everyone doesn't like Myra) I thought it felt more realistic to have someone who looked like both, and also I've always kind of pictured Becca as having her moms weight and hair type, but everything else being Eddie's features, and she has brown eyes and brown hair like him so I thought it fit. Also she's very short. Anyway, picture her however you want to picture her though, this isn't tort law, its just my idea for her.
> 
> Was able to get this chapter out faster than I usually do! I hope you all enjoy! Thanks for all the comments, its super encouraging that you're all so excited. I do this for ya'll!
> 
> :ove you Loser's!

It was nine in the morning when they finally stopped for gas. They’d made it a little outside of Denver and everybody seemed really excited, like this was going to be some road trip of a lifetime. Everyone except Becca. Who could only think about how her dad and Richie would probably be in Derry sooner rather than later. She had a bag of Lay’s that she had been munching on as she leaned against the car, one hand in the bag, Richie’s old jacket still draped over her shoulders. She stared off into the vast distance, her brain barely hearing ‘The Less I Know The Better' from Mendy’s shitty playlist drifting from the car as she felt her subconscious taking over her whole brain. She didn’t even feel the first two taps on her shoulder as she stared off blankly at the building in front of her, mindlessly pointing her gaze ar Mendy laughing with Karmen outside of the gas station entrance.

“HEY, EARTH TO BEC-”

Becca jolted slightly, her chips rattling in the bag as she turned to look at James, who had practically shoved her to get her attention. She immediately scowled.

“What the fuck J, why not just tap me like a normal fucking person-” his eyes went wide “BECAUSE I DID TAP YOU LIKE A NORMAL PERSON AND YOU DIDN’T REACT. WHAT’S-” he looked over at Mendy and immediately his eyes got wide as he turned back to her and gave her a sly look. Becca immediately caught on to what he was thinking, and her own eyes went wide as she glared at him, raising her palm up in an attempt to stop him.

“No James, whatever your thinking, fucking _cease_ -”

“Awww, this is about your little crush isn’t it-” James cackled a little, shaking his head as he leaned against the car with her and stared at Mendy, crossing his arms as Mendy began idly chatting and grinning while they waited on Martin to finish paying for gas. Becca pushed him off the car, slamming her hands iinto his ribs in response to his little statement, which cut him off as he whined “AH FUCK, MY LIVER-”

“OH MY GOD, THAT THING? You destroy that fucking thing DAILY with your excessive drinking, don’t fucking come for me bitch-”

“God, you’re such an asshole, I can’t fucking believe you-”

“Fuck you, its not a crush… besides, she and Martin are gonna wind up dating long distance or some shit, and I already know Martin is like… head over heels in love with her so-”

“Just like how I’m head over heels for Martin, yeah…”

This was the reason James was her best friend. He understood. Becca didn’t truly consider herself ‘gay’, at least not fully, but she definitly considered herself to be a little gay at the minimum. Either way, she’d been gay for Mendy since their English class in freshman year. Unfortunately, Marty had also been gay for her since freshman year, and Becca would be damned if she tried to step in the way of that. It was the same for James though, who proudly identified himself as bisexual around their sophmore year. Proudly and LOUDLY. Yet, the person he’d chosen to develop his depressing crush on wound up being Martin, which Becca remembered that realization being the most ironic shit in the world.

They were already friends before, but after the two of them sat in an old treehouse together and proceeded to drunkenly confess their feelings for the straight power couple of their group… well-

It was certainly a bonding experience to say the least.

“Do you think they’ve tongue-fucked yet?”

“Ew J, do you really think I wanna sit here with you and talk about Mendy and Marty goddamn ‘tounge-fucking- oh god, even their names sound perfect together-”

“Yeah exactly, and Martin never shuts the fuck up about her, its depressing-”

“God tell me about it… and Mendy is so shy and awkward I’m nearly certain she doesn’t even comprehend dating as an option, so she’s fucking clueless to Marty’s flirting…”

They both got quiet again, chuckling to themselves as James wrapped a loose arm around Becca’s shoulder in reassurance. Becca grinned to herself, looking away from Mendy to instead stare at the ground as Martin finally exited the gas station, immediately running up to Mendy like a lost dog. She heard James give off an annoyed groan in response.

“God, she doesn’t know how lucky she is- what I wouldn’t fucking give-” Becca rolled her eyes, shoving him off “don’t tell me about what you’d give, I’m not ready to hear it”.

Becca was back to worrying over Derry in a heartbeat. Her distracted moment coming to an end and her scowl returning to her face as James awkwardly waved a hand in front of her eyes.

“Hey, come on… is this about that fucking hicktown in Maine… Beccy-boo, you _need_ to calm down about that” he whispered, rubbing her shoulder with his hand as she craned her head to glare at him “I can’t fucking calm down, I just… I’ve spent so long preparing for this, and its just now all starting to hit me that we’re going to eventually fucking get there and-” James snorted at that, to which Becca’s eyes widened in irritation as he quickly widened his own eyes in slight fear, cutting his laughter short.

“Sorry I didn’t mean to laugh I just… you really believe this huh?”  
  


Becca snorted back, feeling her temper rise to the surface as she crossed her arms and looked to her right, hellbent on not looking at James.

“You are SUCH a fucking prick, you PROMISED James-” James rose his hands in response as Becca whipped around and glared at him pointing an accusatory finger at his chest “Bec, I’m SORRY dude, you know how I get, I… I did promise, and I’m trying to believe you but I really think you’re getting worked up to a whole different level”.

Becca felt her hand fall as she recrossed her arms, glaring off to the right again as their friends started making their way back to the car. Martin had an arm draped around Mendy ‘jokingly’ which was enough to send Becca into an inner monologue. James opened his mouth and closed it again before finally mustering up the courage to try and speak.

  
“Becca-”

“Whatever dude, lets just go…” she muttered, unfolding her arms and ripping open the passenger door as Diana and Karmen climbed in after her, making their way to the furthest seats of the minivan, leaving the two seats in front of them for Mendy and Martin. 

She heard James opening the drivers side, but refused to look at him as she watched Martin plucking up the gas hose. She really wasn’t mad. She wasn’t. This wasn’t some love triangle she was trapped in, she fully knew that Mendy and Martin really did like each other. Though she figured she was still allowed to grieve the loss a bit. It wasn’t like she ever had a chance to begin with. James understood that too. The loss of it. They both hated that they had to develop crushes on people who wouldn’t reciprocate. James himself had made about a million jokes already about how much easier it would be if they could just fall for eachother.

To be fair though, they did give kissing each other an honest go right after homecoming. 

And honestly, they both hated it.

They both literally swore to each other that they wouldn’t ever talk about it again. That they’d take that awkward kiss to the grave. So far they seemed to be succeeding.

Martin finished pumping the gas and put the petal back in its holder, giving Mendy a soft grin as they moved to climb back into the car together. Becca leaned her head against the window and hated herself silently.

“Ok, so we’re heading out then” Martin asked excitedly, looking between James and Becca and realizing that they must have had an argument or something, his face falling somewhat “oh my god, are you two serious? Come on, you both really can’t go five minutes without trying to fist fight each other-”

Becca finally felt herself listening to the very end of the song. The same song from moments before. It was at the end now. How had it been such a short time? It had felt like hours. 

“We’re fine, I just opened my big dumb mouth and some big dumb shit came out, right Bec” James asked her with nervous wide eyes and a great deal of hesitation, and Becca decided she didn’t wanna fight anymore either. She made a point to look over at him and give him the ghost of a nod along with a half-hearted smile for good measure. Truly none of this had anything to do with her unrequited love, or her anger at James’s words. It honestly all just boiled down to her fear. The fear of what was to come. Or the fear that something would come before she got there.

“Soo… does anyone wanna… I don’t know, do a sing-along or something? No offense, we just have a lotta fuckin’ driving ahead of us, and I don’t wanna sit in silence… I forgot my headphones” Diana grumbled, leaning on Karmen’s shoulder with her head tucked into the frame of her neck. Karmen just grinned with her eyes closed. She couldn’t be bothered to mind.

“Sure, we can talk about how fucking annoyingly cute you two are being in my backseat, and how you need to chill or I’m gonna chuck you out of this vehicle, because it makes the rest of us here feel depressingly single” James snarked as Martin and Mendy chuckled along with him. Diana just glared, sticking up her middle finger in range of the rear view mirror for him to see. “Wow, real classy of you, bullying the bisexual, that’s just a hatecrime-”

“Fuck you guy; us gays fought for our right to hold our girlfriends in public, so I’ll be damned if thats not what I’m gonna do” Diana shouted, causing everyone in the backseat to laugh harder as Becca finally turned around to grin at them, Diana smirking over at Becca “fucking resident asshole Becca is on my side about this, I already know, tell them Bec”.

Becca clucked her tongue as she observed her own nails dramatically, pretending to consider the question. 

  
“I mean… you were being a bit gay back there-”

“OH MY GOD, just chuck me out of the car, fuck all of you I swear-”

“BUT-” 

“Oh shit theres a but, nevermind we’re ok you guys, keep driving-”

“Nothing can ever be gayer than living with my parents so I’d say I’ve developed a tolerance…” Becca shrugged, grinning back at them as Karmen nodded on Diana’s head, not even bothering to open her eyes “It’s true, their auras line up really nicely, they’re probably twin flames-” Diana rolled her eyes as she placed her hand on her girlfriends.

“Twin flame sounds like some hippy shit Teen Magazine tries to convince me of right before they tell me which celebrity crush I’m gonna marry” Karmen opened one eye and grinned down at her “nah, it's just your ultimate soulmate-”

“I thought _soulmates_ were ultimate soulmates…” Mendy asked awkwardly, rubbing the smear on her glasses with her shirt tail. Her sketchbook was resting on her lap, and Becca smiled at the artwork she’d created. Karmen, on the other hand was lost to the conversation.

“So like… soulmates are rare, but you can have multiple soulmates. Like your soulmates could be your group of best friends, so like, we’d all be soulmates, but a twin flame is like… _THE_ love of your life, and there's only one, so society’s traditional idea of a soulmate is _ACTUALLY_ a twin flame-”

“Jesus Christ you hit a fucking a joint earlier without me didn’t you” Diana teased, and Karmen just grinned with a guilty look as Diana scoffed at her, the smile still nestled in her features “you are the absolute worst, I cannot believe you, so selfish-”

“Bold of you to assume I’d need weed to start talking about weird hippy shit-”

“Well shit, you got me there, you talk like your high on a consistent basis… plus I guess I’d hit one too if I was about to fight a killer clown” Diana nodded in thought, but the joke immediately brought a tense atmosphere into the car, causing everyone to fall silent.

“Shit Diana, come on-”

“Fuck REALLY? SHIT, I’M SORRY, I JUST- I talk a lot I don’t have a mute button, but… I mean isn’t this something that we should be talking about it? You know, to get prepared? It's like a massive elephant in the room, and Bec has been weirdly cryptic about it” Becca felt her nostrils flare in annoyance as she turned to look at Diana, eyes flaming as her dark hair whipped around in her turn “I told you _point blank_ that it would be dangerous and we could all die-”

“Yeah I know that, but you didn’t say what IT was, or how the thing operates… look, I still don’t fully believe all of this, but Karmen seems convinced your telling the truth, and I know your not a liar or an insane person Becca but… come on” she shrugged as if it should be obvious. The innate weirdness of their situation. It was. Becca did understand that. So she answered by rubbing her temple and trying to explain “I don’t fully understand it myself; it's not something I’ve ever seen… it calls itself Pennywise and it's some kind of demon that lives in the city”.

Everyone stayed quiet so Becca continued onward.

“It’s affected by the power of belief, so if you don’t believe it can hurt you, it won’t but… it looks real and it feels real according to my dads, and if you give it fear, you give it power… and it uses that against you” Becca let in a small breath as she waited for a reaction. James was eyeing her uncomfortably from the side as everyone else in the car just stared at her, either nervously or with narrowed eyes.

“That seems.... Almost too easy, I mean come on” Martin laughed a little, leaning back a bit “I mean if it's just the power of belief then… you know, we just will it out of existence right?”

Becca was hoping that would be the case. She nodded loosely at Martin, who seemed to let off an easy smile in response. She couldn’t help the feeling that she was giving him false hope.

“Ok, so its a clown that tries to scare you... I’ve seen American Horror Story, I can live with that” Diana nodded, her lips pursed outward in agreement as she looked at Karmen who’s dark brown eyes were still staring widely at Becca. She seemed to be the only one that was still scared.

That and Mendy, who was still staring at Becca with a concerned gaze. Becca had no clue what to say to calm her down.

“What will it turn into…” she barely even heard Mendy’s quiet whisper in the loudness that had erupted in the car, and she turned in her seat to make eye contact with Mendy’s frightened expression. She briefly hated herself for being the cause of Mendy’s fear, but she knew as long as they stayed together, they should be fine “it’ll turn into literally anything…”.

Mendy’s eyes got wider behind her glasses as she blinked rapidly “like… anything anything?”

“Anything Mendy, it can be anything, it can look like anyone… it can be anything that you fear”.

Mendy looked down at her feet but her eyes remained open; traumatized. She looked scared shitless, but she quickly hid the expression when Martin put a hand on her shoulder and shook her.

“Come on Mendy, it’ll be fine, we’ll just use the power of our belief to tell it to fuck off, we’ll be fine” Martin sounded cocky, he was smiling and it seemed to help calm Mendy down, which despite everything fucked up about her own feelings, Becca was certaintly grateful he had that affect on her. Becca had wanted to lie; maybe ease her conscious, but she didn’t want Mendy to be ill prepared for what was coming. 

She also didn’t want Mendy panicking though, so she decided to try and attempt to censor the worst of what she’d been told.

“Yeah, you just have to remember it isn’t real… whatever it shows you, whatever you see, no matter how scary or how real it looks, it isn’t” Becca whispered and Mendy looked at her again, nodding before their conversation was interrupted by James loud yelling.

“WAIT, SO DO YOU THINK I COULD THROW IT OFF ITS GAME IF I THREATENED TO TOUCH IT SENSUALLY-”

“Oh my god, James shut the fuck up, fucking dumb ass _idiot-_ ”

“No, I’m just saying… does the clown get thrown off by confident sexy men like me, because I think I can throw it off its game if-”

“Yeah it’ll take one look at your braces and see a prime candidate for romance” Martin had said it jokingly, and everyone giggled along, but only Becca noticed the way James face changed slightly at the riff. If anyone else had said it James wouldn’t have cared. It was always Martin that hit him differently. He managed to keep his face carefully blank though until he altered his expression and turned to give James a massive full on grin, practically baring his braces in Martin’s face.

“VHAT- DIS DISSN’T DO IT FIR YA MERTY-” he somehow shouted between his clenched teeth, keeping his grin on full display all the while as Martin cringed and slunk into his seat. He was laughing maniacally “Oh my god you sound like my elderly grandfather” Martin cackled as he placed a hand on his stomach and wiped tears from his eyes, and just like that James was back to himself again. Becca just grinned. If any good would come from fighting the clown it was this.

The drive went on like that for a while. A lot of them swearing and screaming at eachother. Mendy mainly sat silently, drawing away in the corner as Becca checked on her from time to time. By eight at night they’d made it as far as Illinois when she finally got the arrival call from Richie. The work phone he’d given her was ringing and she’d taken her shift to drive while everybody else was asleep in the other seats. She answered it, swiping right on the call notification and holding it up to her ear, whispering a quiet “yo-”

“Hey, we just made it to Maine, do you know how hard it is to get away to call you? I had to use diarreia as an excuse because it grossed Eddie out enough to wait to use the bathroom, you forget WE’RE BOTH MEN WHO BOTH USE THE MEN’S BATHROOM, THIS IS HARD AS SHIT- Where are you…?”

“Hey there my dearest father-squared, glad to hear about the diarreia trick, definitely _not_ crushing my appetite _at all_ \- we are currently driving through Illinois, but we’ll be out of this state sooner rather than later so... we’re getting there… it's still gonna be about a twenty hour drive though roughly before we arrive-”

“Well fuck, _good_ , the longer it takes you to get here the better… I literally wanna fucking leave Bec, you have no idea-”

“Hey, Rich… its ok-”

“No I mean… shit I’m venting about this to a child-”

“HEY, I’m nearly eighteen you _corpse-_ ”

“Ok, shut up, that's not the point, the _point_ is that compared to me your basically a child, I’m fucking forty and I’m about to have a goddamn nervous breakdown about the murder clown-” it was in the middle of Richie’s rant that Becca noticed James staring at her, one eye open as he gestured for her to put it on speaker. Not wanting to wake the others, she turned her phone volume down and held it in the middle, her other hand still on the wheel as she stared ahead at the darkened road, Jame’s staring at the caller ID intensely as Richie continued.

“Did I tell you I threw up again? Yeah… real fucking smooth of me, I feel like I’m about to have a fucking nervous breakdown Bec, I don’t think I can do this-”

“But won’t you die if you don’t…?”

“Fucking Bev said that bullshit, but I didn’t see anything... Mike seems to think it has something to do with the deadlights, but so far one of the deaths she saw hasn’t happened and-”

“Fuck… who’s death, what did she see…?”

James was staring at the phone with wide eyes now, looking up occasionally to stare at Becca in shock before looking back at the phone.

“Beccy, you _really_ don’t want to know-”

“Was it Dad? Like, other dad, like Eddie, I can’t… did she see-”

“Sweetheart, it was Uncle Stan… she saw Uncle Stan kill himself…”

Everything goes quiet. James is sitting up further now as he listens, and Becca has to pull over the car as she feels her breathing getting heavier. James places a reassuring hand on her shoulder as she holds in a fit of hyperventilation.

“But he didn’t do it, obviously, so I’m wondering if those were just like… potential futures, and maybe we’ve already altered it, maybe there's no need to go back, I can’t say but-”

“W-what if it gets worse…?”

She heard Richie exhale on the phone as he seemed to clearly be back on his fit of worrying.

“I don’t know Bec, maybe it will maybe it won’t… I don’t know… doesn’t matter though, because Eddie isn’t gonna let me leave, he doesn’t want us forgetting things, wants to remember his past- I’d leave if he’d leave with me but… he’s hellbent on this, just like you were” Becca let out a wet laugh, giggling lightly as she placed a hand over Jame’s grasp “yeah, we’re a lot alike I hear-”

“You little turd, are you sure you don’t wanna just drive that car to Chicago and get plastered with your friends? I never thought I’d say this, but I’d actually prefer you do that... shit, I’ll even fund it-”

“No Richie, we’re already halfway there, we’re doing this to make sure you don’t die and I wouldn’t be able to get plastered anyway if I spent the whole time worrying that I’d just become an orphan, so...” the line got quiet as Richie exhaled loudly into the phone again. She could almost see his look of exasperation “yeah, ok Bec… be safe once again and... “

“Yeah Rich, I know… better hurry, if you stay in the bathroom with the diarrhea excuse for too long, Dad’s gonna call the ambulance on you-” Richie snorted over the phone as Becca finally found her breathing had evened out, feeling Jame’s hand grazing her shoulder; grounding her for a moment. “Yeah, ok Gremlin… hey, I love you… shits about to get weird over here so… just…”

“I know Dad, I love you too…”

She heard Richie laugh wetly before hanging up, and Becca lowered the phone and breathed out slowly to try and calm her racing heart as James stared at her in shock.

“Holy shit they weren’t lying…” 

Becca turned to stare at James, who she wanted to snark at but realized quickly that now would not be the time. James whole face had changed into one of dread. He was clearly on the verge of a small panic attack, and Becca didn’t know what she could say to reassure him after Richie’s glowing Derry recommendation. 

  
  


“I wish you were right, I wish they were in Bora Bora getting drunk as fuck without me…” Becca let out another shaky laugh as she put the car back in drive, but she felt the pressure of James’s hand over hers as it stayed settled on the gears “so wait… all that shit and what you said, that's how we beat it?”

Becca nodded slowly as she lifted her foot off the brakes, turning the car back onto the road as she continued nodding almost manically “yeah… that’s how we beat it…”.

The night went by in brief flashes of white headlights and distant city skylines. Becca stared ahead at the road for all of it. Not even feeling any flashes of tiredness as her brain could only consider what horrific shit that might be happening to her family. They had to be in Derry by now. They absolutely had to be. And she wouldn’t even be getting to Derry until the late afternoon at the earliest.

The road trip playlist came back on as soon as Mendy woke up at five, so naturally she woke everyone else with her. She’d decided to move up to the passengers seat beside Becca’s as James’s and Marty moved to sit beside each other so they could play DS together. Secretly, though, she knew that Jame’s only swapped because he wanted to torture her. Fucking prick.

“So… you’re dads…” Becca looked at Mendy who was staring ahead at the road with a carefully blank tone, her short curls framing her face and hiding her expressions “they survived this thing?”

Becca nodded as Mendy closed her eyes in some small form of relief. She didn’t mention how her family was now practically infected. How if they failed to kill Pennywise, they’d all eventually die gruesome deaths. She didn’t mention those things, because this would succeed. It had to.

“I’m glad… makes me feel better but… if your right, and it shows you what you fear, I already know It’s gonna show me my mom…” Mendy whispered it for only Becca’s ears, causing her to turn her head to look at Mendy who was cradling her knees in her arms, her glasses falling onto her freckle-speckled nose. Mendy’s mom was something that Mendy never talked about. She’d told Becca the story once, but it was still shocking to hear, let alone think about. Mendy had moved to LA with her Uncle shortly after she’d found her Mother’s body in their apartment. Her mother had committed suicide. Mendy had been fifteen when she found her. She still didn’t know why she did it. 

“Yeah…” Becca whispered, laying her hand out to hold her hand reassuringly “its gonna show me mine too…”.

Mendy smiled sadly, nodding. Their situations were completely different. They alternated entirely from one another. Yet they managed to find a bond in the inbetween. They could relate to each other’s loneliness. Mendy clutched her hand tighter.

“It’s probably gonna tell me that she did it because of me Bec” Mendy was speaking so quietly that Becca almost didn’t catch the words, but she nodded at her slightly. Mendy caught the gesture because she looked back down at her feet as tears began to catch in her eyes. Becca couldn’t help placing a hand on her cheek “hey, come on… we won’t leave you to see it alone, I won’t leave you, I promise”.

Mendy cried a little more and Becca hated herself for it. All she could do was try to reassure her with her hand on Mendy's as she nodded with the grip, smiling slightly every few seconds as she took off her glasses and stared at the nothing by her feet.

“My mom’s gonna tell me she wished I’d never been born; you know that… the key thing however, is that I know that isn’t true… I know it in my bones, just like you know in your bones that you aren’t the reason for what you’re mother did, yeah?”

Mendy nodded in her grip again, eyes closed as she accepted the words.

“Yeah, I know Beccy…”

Becca ignored the twinge her chest made at the nickname that Mendy so rarely used (mainly because she assumed Becca hated it and actually respected Becca’s wishes on nicknames). Becca finally lowered her hand, moving it back to the wheel in a desperate attempt to regain a handle on the situation. Mendy was wiping her cheeks with her sleeve as she smiled ahead at the road, changing a song on the playlist as they kept driving. Becca would look back on this moment fondly, despite everything that she knew was coming.

They drove for hours, idly chatting. The time flew by like minutes as they drove the car up to Maine. Martin had begged to stop at some tourist traps, but Becca refused. 

“This isn’t a vacation Marty, this is a fucking rescue. An ambulance doesn’t stop for Snickers halfway through the trip to save a man’s life-”

They made it through Indiana, then eventually Ohio; which they definitely didn’t fail to crack jokes about.

“All I’m saying is that every weirdo in the world is from Ohio, and I’D KNOW, because all of my cousins still live there, and all they do is smoke shitty weed, cry about ‘getting out’ of their small town, and date ‘horse girls’” Karmen’s nose wrinkled as she stared at James “what the hell is a horse girl?”

“Those chicks that are way too into horses for their own good. They’re the ones who hang up ‘Live, Laugh, Love’ posters in their rooms and befriend their teachers-” Mendy raised an awkward hand at Jame’s rant “um, I am friends with my teachers and I like horses…”

“Congratulations horse girl, your just a step away from your first vanilla looking ‘no place like home’ poster-”

Becca decided to push the heat off of Mendy’s roast.

“Doesn’t the show Glee take place in Ohio-”

There was an immediate audible groan as everyone covered their faces and rolled their eyes in response; James’s eyes going round as he lets out a hyena laugh and screeches “YOU JUST PROVED MY POINT, EVERY WEIRDO IS FROM OHIO-”

They pushed up through Pennsylvania, then they eventually made it to New York, which definitely had Mendy reeling. This was a place she’d always wanted to go. Becca watched as she stared out the window at the darkening sky, her eyes lit up from the artificial color surrounding her gaze. It highlighted her freckled face perfectly. Becca could only smile. So could Martin. 

“If you’d told me a few days ago that I’d be in New York for the first time, I wouldn’t have believed you…” she whispered, and Becca just smiled at her, whispering “I know we can’t stop right now but… fuck it, when we kill this thing, we should come stop by New York City to celebrate”.

Mendy gave her a wide smile, her face radiating such a strong emotion it made Becca wonder if she’d been cynical for too long, if she was even capable of making that expression.

“I’d like that Bec”

They made it to Vermont… New Hampshire… it was late now. The darkened sky becoming more and more unsettling until…

Becca felt her heart constrict as she saw the ‘Welcome to Maine’ sign. Everyone sat up and stared a little closer at the outside. Despite everything, Maine was certainly beautiful.

“So, how far are we from Derry right now Becca…” it came out clipped; unnerved. Karmen was staring straight ahead at the road as Diana asked the questions for her “how soon will shit starts happening, can it… can IT already sense us-”

“I don’t know” it came out more exasperated than she’d intended. She was just trying to keep her heart attack clenched down “I don’t know if it can sense us but we’re twenty minutes out-”

“Shit… ok, let's pull out the weapons, I think that's a good place to start” James firmly stated from behind Becca’s seat, and she had to send him a mental ‘thank you’ because he was clearly done being a dick and taking this seriously. They pulled open the duffel bag, everyone yanking out different weapons as Becca stared ahead at the foggy road. She could barely comprehend any words coming from her friends behind her. She couldn’t even look at Mendy, who was still scrunched in on herself in a nervous panic.

“Give me the bat” Diana growled, gripping the lower half of the bat at the same time as James’s, who just narrowed his eyes at her “fuck off, this is my bat-”

“Fucking tin-toothed dickhead, its mine, I called it back at the house when we discussed weapons, remember?”

“All I remember is you ‘jokingly’ saying you wanted the bat to defend yourself from the towny hicks, but you don’t actually think we’re going to see anything in Derry, so I deserve this bat-” James and Diana continued screaming at each other about the bat debate. Becca barely listened as she and Mendy stared at the road, hearing Mendy’s sharp inhale as they passed by a ‘Welcome to Derry’ sign. The sign had a balloon. A red fucking baloon. Immediately Mendy pushed away from the windows.

“Holy fuck, holy fuck, holy fuck-” Mendy didn’t seem to have a mental idea of how often she was saying ‘holy fuck’ she just seemed to be going for as long as her lungs would give her. Becca on the other hand took the opposite approach to her fear, staying quiet as a mouse but glaring furiously out the window.

“Calm the fuck down, its just a fucking balloon-”

“Where, I didn’t see anything-”

“Fuck off, right behind us”

“Goddamnit, I knew this ghost hunting shit was a bad idea, Karmen baby, I don’t think I wanna go to Salem anymore, I don’t think my heart can handle it-”

“EVERYONE SHUT THE FUCK UP-”

Becca’s words were the final words, and they worked. Everyone immediately snapped their mouths shut as Becca slammed the breaks of the car. Everyone stared at her, unsure of why she’d stopped, but Becca was breathing heavily and her fists were gripping the wheel tightly, as if letting go meant the end. She was shaking. Staring ahead at the road as everyone’s gaze followed her own, matching her line of sight until-

IT.

“WHAT THE FUCK, IS THAT A MASSIVE FUCKING CLOWN-”

Becca didn’t even know who said it as she made eye contact with glowing yellow eyes. The tall frame of the clown standing in front of the car as she kept her foot frozen on the break, her eyes narrowing as the clown lifted a hand to wave at her, fully animated and janky in the worst ways. He almost didn’t look real. He couldn’t be real. But he was. 

“FUCKING UGLY ASS HAIR LINE, WHAT THE FUCK, EW ITS FOREHEAD-”

She knew that had to be Diana. Her mind was aware of that but all she could stare at was the clown looking right at her and _smiling_. Like it knew her. She panicked. She took her foot off the brakes and slammed it into the accelerator.

“HOLY SHIT BECCA, WHAT THE FUCK, DON’T-” it was James screaming that at her. He knew what she was doing, but even she could barely focus on anything that wasn’t driving this fucking car into that _shitty fucking clown and running him over._ The only words sprinting through her brain were ‘fuck, does he know? Does he fucking know me? He can’t-’ in a hurried spill of panic. The car screeched forward in the middle of the abandoned Derry road as she drove towards impact. She watched as the clown never quit smiling. James was pushing at her shoulder now. She was hellbent on fucking killing this thing-

_“Hello Beccy-”_

And then she swerved. 

It was a cheerful voice that whispered in her ear and she flinched, turning the wheel to the right in panic as the whisper of her name came from her left. The car spun, turning off the road and slammed into a lightpost to the right of the road. The car made impact and crunched; Becca being thrown against the wheel and Mendy gripping at the roof of the car in horror. It didn’t total it. The car was still in one piece. The group however-

“HOLY SHIT BECCA, ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING-”

“Guys, I think I heard something…”

“Fuck this shit, I wanna go home, FUCKING FUCK THIS-”

None of these words were Becca’s, but she could feel the words strongly as she laid against the wheel, pushing herself back up and making a shushing notion as they heard something hop onto the top of the car. Martin stared wide-eyed at the ceiling of the vehicle with James standing at his shoulder, lifting the bat and ready to attack. Karmen was holding Diana, her eyes staring intently at the window to their right as Diana continued whispering “I wanna go home…” in Karmen’s arms. 

Becca turned to her right to finally look at Mendy, who was staring right back at her. Her eyes were hard and her teeth were clenched as she looked to be holding back tears.

_“Mmmmm… what is that smell…”_ a voice whispered above them, and around them. Like it was coming from their own fucked up minds. They heard a rough laugh. Childlike, yet demonic. 

“ _Beccy-boo, have you come to dance with the clown…”_ it was at this point that Becca was in full panic, because this fucking thing knew her, and as if it was reading her mind it just laughed “ _I’ve known you from the minute your filthy parents set foot in this town Beccy, I’m more than you could even comprehend… even when your bones become brittle and your skull turns to dust in the Earth, I shall be here... eternal, and you… you are an ant beneath my feet, and yet... you thought you could kill me”_ IT was laughing hysterically above them, the footsteps on the top of the car inching towards her side as she released her grip on the wheel and stared down at the knife that had flown up front out of the duffelbag. She mentally had to laugh. Maybe this was Richie’s telepathic way of looking out for her.

She could hear IT moving towards her window, watching as a gloved hand placed itself on the glass. She could vaguely hear others screaming in the back. Could hear James trying to open his car door only to find he couldn’t unlock it.

“BREAK THE FUCKING WINDOW MORON, ITS FUCKING COMING-” Martin shrieked at him as James kept attempting to open the lock. James glared and shook his head “FUCK NO, IF I BREAK THE WINDOW HOW AM I GONNA EXPLAIN THAT SHIT TO MY MOM-” Martin looked at him like he was the biggest fucking idiot, mouth open in shock and his eyes pointing a glare like knives.

“THE FRONT OF YOUR CAR JUST EXPLODED DUDE, WE’RE BEYOND THAT, ITS GONNA-”

The hand slammed the window, causing it to crack as Becca held her breath, keeping her mind carefully blank as she held the knife in both hands, her head staring forward but her eyes watching the hand until.

_“BOO BECCA-”_

IT had a wide variety of teeth when she shot the knife upwards, into its deformed skull. Her brain could only comprehend the feeling of the knife entering into its throat. The smell of the sewage it was probably wafting in. She didn’t even hear everyone else shouting in reaction to the clown. IT laughed brokenly as its blood seemed to drip upward from the knife. Becca watched it, her own eyes glaring in anger as IT finally seemed to be yanked away from the window. Like a ragdoll being pulled.

It slunk into the woods, its body a weird mesh of breaking apart and reforming back together as she watched the yellow eyes disappear into the dark shadows of the trees. Becca clenched her teeth and opened the door, trying to follow after it. The eyes began to lose their glow though as IT’s voice faded off into the night.

  
 _“You think you can save them… you're silly little family”_ IT’s rough voice bounced around her, the echo taunting her as she watched the eyes fade “ _you can’t”._


	3. And All Of The Houses They Built In The 70's Finally Fall...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey I'll keep this short and sweet. Sorry for the hiatus. I am back. I had finals week and it tore me up if I'm being honest. My last official day was yesterday though so I will be back to regular updating I hope. Also I tried to be more careful with the 'their' and 'they're' this time along with the 'your' and 'you're' but if I slipped up I'm sorry. My friend offered to go through and edit chapters though so if there is an error she will try to catch it and fix it (sorry as much as I love writing, grammer is not my strong suit lol).
> 
> Thank you for the patience Loser's, I love you all!

Everyone exited the car disoriented and confused; the night somehow feeling darker than it did moments before. The fog was still vastly present and the car was smoking in the background of Becca’s mind as she stood there staring at the spot the clown had slunk to. Her heart beating rapidly in her ear as she heard the noises of her friends bouncing at her from the background.

“Becca…”

She took a hesitant step across the road to look closer. To make sure it was really gone. She couldn’t be sure. Deep down she knew it wasn’t really gone. It was somewhere here. Watching her. Watching all of them. The thing was an omnipotent demon in Derry. Anywhere they went, IT wasn’t far.

“BEC, JESUS CHRIST-”

She was being shaken and her eyes blinked as she reawoke from her glassed out expression. She looked to her left to see Mendy shaking her, staring at her intently as Jame’s stood alert with his bat; the other three huddled together by the car looking scared out of their mind. Becca blinked again. She couldn’t even remember what had become of her. What brought them to this point. She just remembered the balloon and…

Was she being manipulated?

She refocused on Mendy’s voice.

“Hey” the word that felt more like an odd sound came out of Becca’s throat hoarse and confused. Her mouth was slightly open as she narrowed her eyes in confusion, cocking her head slightly as she looked around the road. She didn’t even feel the hand that was now pressed onto her shoulder. The hand that was undoubtedly Mendy’s. All she could think was how it was weird that no one had passed them. Guess not a lot of people ever leave Derry all things considered.

“Bec- Jesus Christ, you're bleeding- Fuck… Bec, what the fuck were you thinking-”

Becca felt her eyes get watery as she closed her mouth into a sacred line and shook her head rapidly.

“IT whispered to me-” Mendy blinked and stared in confusion, letting out a confused sigh but her hand never moved from Becca’s shoulder “what?”  
  


“It… or rather it ‘IT’... the fucking thing whispered ‘ _Beccy’_ in my ear. When I was driving I figured we’d either hit it, or kill it, and it would disappear since its… I mean its not _fucking real,_ but I _heard it_ and it whispered _‘Hello Beccy’_ in my _fucking ear_ and I _flinched-_ ”

“Jesus Bec…” that voice was James. She gently lifted her hand to her forehead and felt the blood that Mendy had warned about. It felt like a lot but her brain was so scrambled she couldn’t even find it in herself to care. She turned to James “does your mom have a first aid kit?”

James blinked before he nodded, backing up and running towards the car to head for the glovebox, pulling out what looked to be _straight fucking vodka_ and some goddamn _hello kitty band-aids._ Becca shook her head and gestured at him in exasperation.

“Oh my god, _that’s_ your idea of a fucking first aid kit you complete fucking moron, what the fuck are you doing with a whole _OPENED_ bottle of vodka in your car, and how did that NOT break-”

“I saw this shit in a movie, you just pour liquor on the wound and it kills germs- and you know what, FUCK YOU, ok? I WASN’T PLANNING ON FIGHTING KILLER CLOWNS WHEN I ARRANGED FOR THESE BAND-AIDS IN MY CAR-”

Becca glared with her hand on her forehead as she shrugged out of Mendy’s grasp, walking towards the bottle of alcohol and the cheap bandages. She used an old fast food restaurant napkin to wipe away the blood before holding her breath, taking a quick swig of vodka for courage and quickly pouring some on one of the napkins and dabbing it on the wound as she hissed at the burn.

“Ok, _this shit?_ I didn’t sign up for this, we have to fucking call our parents- I don’t know what the fuck we’re going to say, but we gotta say something, because no offense? But I don’t think we have a FUCKING SHOT at beating that thing Becca, that fucker was straight up LOVECRAFTIAN HORROR, I mean, did you see IT’S FUCKING FACE- NOT ONLY WAS IT PAINFULLY UNMOISTURIZED, BUT THE FUCKING THING LOOKED STRAIGHT UP _BROKEN-_ ”

“Fine, then leave Marty, do what you gotta do- I’m not going anywhere though, fuck that” she shook her head, handing the bottle to James who quickly snuck a long swig as she glared at Martin, making eye contact as she shouted “that ‘ _Lovecraftian Horror_ ’ is what my parents are fighting _RIGHT FUCKING NOW,_ and I know their gonna do something stupid to get themselves killed-”

“ _YOU_ JUST DID SOMETHING STUPID AND ALMOST GOT _YOURSELF_ KILLED, THE APPLE DIDN’T FALL FAR FROM THE FUCKING TREE BEC. IT’S NOT OUR FAULT YOUR PARENTS ARE FUCKING DEMON HUNTERS-”

She saw red.

“THEY AREN’T FUCKING _DEMON HUNTERS,_ THIS IS THE THING THAT TRIED TO KILL THEM AS KIDS, AND IF THEY DON’T KILL IT, THEY ARE GOING TO _FUCKING DIE…”_

Everyone went quiet as Becca breathed heavily and fell against the car in defeat, placing her head in her hands as her exhaustion and pain started to seep into her features. She didn’t make a noise as she sat there, but she shook. No one could see her face as her arms moved to cross around her head, gripping her knees but everyone knew she was crying. Her shaking progressively got worse as Karmen was the first to act.

She stepped forward towards the car, kneeling next to where Becca had collapsed and pulled her forward into a hug, gripping her tightly as Becca collapsed into her weight.

No one said anything. The only noise made in the embrace was Becca’s quiet sobs and Karmen’s calmed shushes as she held her. Mendy walked forward and bent down to Becca’s right, hugging both of them close in an effort to help calm her down.

Soon, everyone was hugging, but it was no longer purely a comfort to Becca. It was almost like a defense mechanism. A way to attempt to relax… just fucking _anything_. It felt entirely necessary because everyone could feel their hearts beating way too fast, and the only thing they were sure of in this shitty town was that the six of them were real. Martin was the only one who hadn’t joined the hug, still desperately looking at his phone with a trembling hand, simply staring at his mother's contact information.

“Marty…” he looked up to see Mendy staring at him from the embrace and he shook his head, eyes wet “don’t fucking ask me to stay Men… please don’t”.

Mendy exhaled through her nose, looking up at him through cracked glasses, eventually holding her hand out to Martin who looked at her hand with a pained expression, looking back up at her fearfully. Her mouth was in a thin line.

“I don’t think I can do this…”

Everyone watched him carefully, holding their own hands out with Mendy’s as he sighed and put his phone back in his jacket pocket, shaking his head and walking over to the group; almost immediately he fell to his knees to hug them.

“I j-just… I’ve never been so suh-scared-” he sniffled, sounding younger than he was as they all hugged him closer, scared that if they separate they’ll be alone in the dark. Like being stuck on the safety of a ledge, but knowing there's no other option than to jump. For that moment though that ledge was safe. And they had time to prepare themselves for the fall.

“The car is… it looks pretty fucked up, my moms gonna kill me Becca-” James sounded nothing like himself, the words practically whimpering out of his mouth as Becca squeezed his shoulder in reassurance “we’ll tell her it was my fault, I don’t mind taking the blame, we can tell her we were on a senior trip to Canada-”

James snorted in defeat.

“She’ll like that even less…” Becca rolled her eyes at his reaction, whispering a small “You can’t do everything in life just for her J…”.

Becca knew he already knew that. He wouldn’t listen though. All and all his mom was a pretty nice person, but her son was her _only son_ , and she was scared shitless of losing her only child. Martin was always trying to make her happy. She didn’t even buy it when James nodded at her words as if he’d considered them.

“Well, just tell her it was my fault and that we were planning to be back by Tuesday, tell her whatever you need to tell her, even if it means throwing me under the bus James… I’m sure she’ll understand that accidents happen”

Karmen petted at his hair in reassurance. Or what she hoped would be reassurance.

“She’s right James, you just need to relax… we’re all here, and the car is honestly not too damaged… lets see if we can push it off of the light post and hide it in the woods”

It honestly was a half-baked scheme of hiding the car from the authorities (at least long enough to beat the clown). One that was unlikely to work. However, they were also slightly stupid. James was buzzed enough from his two swigs of vodka to buy it, and everyone else so disoriented from the crash they were bordering on lunacy. They figured it was fine as they lifted themselves off of the ground and pushed the car away from the pole, turning off its unbroken lights and leaving it in the thick woods. They stood a distance from the car, stepping back outside of the brush in a sort of circle.

“Right… we’re here in Derry so… Becca, you’re the expert, what now?”

They all looked at her as she stared blankly at the five of them, her bloodied knife still in her right hand and her brain trying to unscramble from the event of the previous hour.

“There's a gun store in Derry and we’re gonna find it- Marty, will you pull up google maps?”

“GUN STORE? WHAT THE FUCK- WE’RE NOT EVEN _EIGHTEEN,_ AND BUYING GUNS IS A WHOLE PROCESS, THEY WILL NEVER SELL US A GUN BECCA-”

She smirked tiredly and pulled out her fake ID as if to prove a point.

“This baby says I’m twenty-four and that my name is Amanda Goldstein; and besides, we’re trapped in rural America where you can walk into a fucking Wal-Mart and they’ll sell you a gun for a small bag of crack and a plucky personality, no ones gonna stop us-”

“Bec, I’m pretty sure these people will know a fake ID when they see it” Martin whispered and Becca just snorted as she laughed, walking them out of the woods and back out to the foggy Derry road; empty with no signs of life “these people are stupid as fuck from what I hear, they probably don’t even know how to read-”

“As funny a joke as that is, they have to know how to read so they can read the fucking holy bible Bec, that’s the whole vibe of the town we are trapped in right now” Diana muttered, seething beside Karmen as they all kept walking down th abandoned Derry road. They eventually found some wonky looking stop called ‘Gun N’ Fun’.

“Well it's got a shitty pun for the name, so I’m sure it's a reputable gun purchasing location” Martin let out sarcastically beside Becca, who just gave him a grin and waggled her eyebrows.

“Amanda is about to get us the shit we need y'all, just you wait”

And they waited and waited. It took longer than any of them would have expected. They all huddled beside each other in the dim light of the flickering overhead streetlamp as they sat.

“You know, this really reminds me of when we all bought liquor for the first time,” Martin said softly, taking a swig of the vodka that James had managed to sneak with them. They decided to pass the time by passing it around.

“Yeah” Karmen grinned to herself “we all forced Becca to do it, and she shrieked at us for a solid five minutes before doing it just to show us up”.

It was nice. The reminiscing. It was something that wasn’t scary at least. No one noticed the flickering red of the light; just for a brief moment. A mili-second. They didn’t see the silhouette either. They did however turn their heads to see Becca who did a sprint-strut out of the gun store with a bag in hand, grinning ear to ear as she made her way to the group.

“Holy fuck, holy fuck, I actually fucking got it, what the fuck” Becca whispered to them, opening the bag slightly to show them the small box for the handgun inside. They all just stared at it.

“Um, good time to ask this but… does anyone actually _know_ how to use this thing?”

Becca gulped and looked down awkwardly, because to be honest, she hadn’t thought of that.

“Uh…”

“Oh my god, you really didn’t plan SHIT did you, you talk a lot about how brainless your family is, but if I’m being honest, your just as clueless as your parents-”

Becca gaped at her with wide eyes, a look of horror on her face.

“EXCUSE YOU-”

“GUYS, WE CAN FIGURE IT OUT, WE’RE NOT BOOMERS- WE HAVE GOOGLE, LETS JUST GOOGLE IT”

Everyone seemed to agree with Diana’s words as they nodded in response, walking away from the parking lot as the lights flickered again, but nobody noticed. They were too busy typing away on their phones.

“So- OH YES, here’s an entire article written by some crazy fucking conservative militia man from Texas, so we know _he_ knows his shit… God Becca, what are you driving me to… fucking depending my life on a Fox News viewer...” Diana shouted, holding up a step-by-step tutorial article on loading a gun “we should probably find somewhere to go though to load it, maybe back to the car?”

Becca nodded as they began to walk back the way they came. She kept feeling like something was clawing at the back of her head though. A thought or a feeling. She swore she heard whispers.

“Are you guys getting weird vibes, because I think that freako clown is going to try some shit soon…” James whispered as he held his bat up further “I’m starting to think we can just load the gun in the street to be honest… its late as fuck and I’m pretty sure everyone in this town is under an Icelandic clown spell-”

_“Iceland huh James?”_

He flinched immediately, swinging the bat at the source of the voice and nearly clobbering off Mendy’s head who ducked to the ground as James swung. The clown wasn’t there as Becca tripped in desperation to evade the sickeningly sweet voice, but there was no source.

“FUCK THAT WHAT THE FUCK-” Martin was screaming on repeat as Mendy finally rose a hand up to calm him down, trying to ease the situation back down from a hundred.

“You dipshits, its fucking with us” she growled, which caught everyones attention as Karmen and Diana finally opened their eyes “like what Becca said, it needs our fear, and if you guys keep flinching everytime you hear IT’s voice, we aren’t gonna be able to do this”.

Becca felt herself staring. Out of everyone in the group she expected to speak common sense, Mendy wasn’t high up on the list. Not that she wasn’t capable. But that she so rarely ever spoke. Mendy turned to her and nodded.

“Yeah, she’s right, we… fuck… its not even doing wild shit and we’re flinching like idiots, here I have an idea” Becca whispered, turning on her phone and flipping to her Spotify “we’re done letting it make scary voices at us, fuck him, its not even like… good scaring me, I mean its creepy- legitimently its the voice whispering in our ears thats scaring us, so we’re just gonna blast Diana’s playlist-”

Diana’s eyes glowed like stars at the news, even despite her moist eyes and shaky expression.

“Oh my god yes, I promise you I’ll be in more of a fighting vibe if you start the list on _Cold, Cold Cold_ please” Diana begged; so Becca complied. She turned on the song and cranked up the volume on her phone as high as it would go. It wasn’t perfect. Obviously it could still make noise and they’d still hear. The playlist would help to be a distraction though. At least it wasn’t made for nothing.

Everyone huddled closer as they tried to walk back to the car. They didn’t even know what street they were or where they were. Becca also had no idea where her parents were, or if the clown had messed with them. It was worrying.

“God this place is like a ghost town…” Karmen commented nervously, and Becca turned and nodded “yeah, I think it's that carnival in town… or it could just be the clown fucking with us, who knows-”

“I think its fucking with us” Becca whispered it darkly, but it was the truth as she kept stepping forward “it has a hold on the people in this town, I think it's doing this to unnerve us-”

“Shit… that must be why it's so foggy and empty… this is my shit-”

Everyone turned to look at Martin, who had been silent for so long it was shocking to hear his voice. Martin’s eyes were wide as he’d slowed his walk, looking terrified at their surroundings.

“When I was a kid, I played through Silent Hill with my older brother- like the original one… but I could never play them alone and eventually they started to give me nightmares…” as if on cue the casual mist from earlier had gotten thicker, mixing in specks of white that felt almost like snow or dust. It was so thick that nobody could see. They could vaguely hear Cage The Elephants droaning vocals as everyone backed into a small circle for support. The song seemed to be moving slower than before though.

James eyes got wide as the mist thickened and he turned his head slightly to glare at him “I fucking hate you, you goddamn prick- you just _had_ to be scared of mist and now we all have to suffer the consequences-” Martin’s eyes bulged.

“I’M NOT SCARED OF MIST YOU FUCKING IDIOT, I’M SCARED OF-”

A man… not a man. Becca gaped up at what she had already suspected would come. A model she knew well. Much more horrific when it wasn’t a textured character on a screen. It stood tall. Taller than any actual person could be. The pyramid on its head depriving it of any human emotion. Not that it was human anyway. It stood as just a blackened shadow in the mist, but it made sure to lift its large blade. A blade that she suspected was taller than her.

“Run…” Becca whispered as everyone quit bickering to stare at her.

“Becca, what?”

“FUCKING MOVE-” she outstretched her arms to push at the people behind her as the figure began charging towards them, IT's features becoming more distinguishable amongst the chaos of the desperately shoving crowd. She felt Karmen fall over as the rest tripped backwards; Diana pushing away from the group to try and grab for her girlfriend.

It swung and missed Becca’s stomach by an inch. She was front and center as the towering mass lowered the blade, standing back up to its full height in front of her. She could hear Martin hyperventilating as the gray-skinned monstrosity watched.

James grabbed Martin’s shoulder, yanking him further back behind him as he placed the hand back onto his bat, lifting it at attention. Becca backed up slowly, scared of sudden movements as Mendy gravitated around her like an orbit.

“Fuck no, FUCK-”

Martin was screaming that repeatedly in the drowned out noise of everything as the phone glitched and changed songs. It was the soundtrack to the fucking game. The eerie moaning of wind that wasn’t there. The whine of broken sounds. Symbols tapping like footsteps. The thing was going all out. She had to laugh insanely at herself as the 'spared no expense' joke briefly brushed her thoughts.

“Martin” Becca whispered as Pyramid Head stepped closer, lifting the bloodied blade towards Becca’s neck as Mendy shrieked, but Becca took a break closed her eyes and kept speaking clearly “its not fucking real man-”

“EASY FOR YOU TO SAY MISS ‘ _I BEAT OUTLAST IN A FUCKING DAY WITHOUT BATTING AN EYE_ ’, NOT ALL OF US HAVE FIGHT INSTINCTS, I’M IN FULL FLIGHT RIGHT NOW AND I CAN’T EVEN FLEE, FUCK THAT-”

“Martin” Becca’s voice didn’t sound like her own. She knew she was trapped in an unnerving calm. She never broke eye contact with the monstrosity in front of her, the blade still held at her neck “It’s not Pyramid Head, its a fucking prick clown-”

She felt the sword waver by her neck, cutting her slightly, but she managed to calm her breathing. She’d never found Pyramid Head that scary, which helped, but she also kept reminding herself that this wasn’t real. This thing in front of her was an illusion. She felt only slight pride as she watched the vision shriek at her words.

“Yeah, fuck you clown, your little costume isn’t fooling me, you piece of trash fuckin’... have you really been alive for god knows how long and you _choose_ to LARP as a disgusting sewer clown?”

And with a blink, the monster in front of her vanished. She exhaled, the cut still present on her neck but not deep. She lifted a hand to it. It couldn’t kill her, but it must have been getting its power from something to still be present. Martin’s fear maybe...

That was unfortunate.

It re-emerged from the mist, this time completely bypassing Becca and slashing for Martin’s back before.

Bonk.

“YEAH, GET SOME YOU UGLY BITCH-” 

Becca turned to see that the massive figures arm having been pierced by the nailed bat. So well in fact that James had lost his grip on it when the nightmare flung its injured arm; the bat still impaled into his bicep.

“FUCKING IDIOT YOU LOST THE BAT-”

The figure turned the opposite direction, its back facing the group but it wasn’t running this time. IT laughed lightly, the clown’s real voice sneaking out as its arm seemed to dissolve into a clothed clown arm, the whole body vibrating at a frequency nothing could move at. They stared as the laughing got louder and they each heard a sharp crack, the clowns head twisting as the bones creaked to accommodate the change. It was Pennywise. Staring back as the rest of IT’s costume faded into his clown form. His body was still backwards as the head smiled at them. Like a fucked up owl. The bat still stuck out of IT’s arm. 

“ _Poor poor Beccy, couldn’t even save her deeeear parents-”_

Her heart dropped, but she chose not to believe it.

“You’re fucking wrong- my parents are fine, they promised me-”

_“Tasty, tasty they were… so much… f-fear they had… at the end-”_

“Bitch, I’ve been a liar for years and I’m much better at it than you, now fuck off you decrepit old wrinkle-”

The clown twitched its head at them, eyes lit to where the only thing they could see of the face (aside from the unnerving smile) was the glow of the eyes. It stepped backwards, which for them was forwards towards the group. Becca didn’t move as the others flinched. She refused to believe her parents were dead. They couldn’t be. This was what IT did. It lied.

“You’re just as bad as my fucking mother, just lying to get your way-”

“ _Oooooh Beccy… you shouldn’t speak ill of the dead-”_

Becca stared at him, tears forming as she shook her head. It was something she hadn’t thought about for a while. Her mother. Everything revolving around her death. Despite everything it still hurt. She needed to remind herself that this was what IT was trying to achieve in her. This reaction. She couldn’t give it to him.

“ _Oooh but you will…”_

Another bone snapped and suddenly it was staring at Karmen before its body began to contort. They all watched in horror as its body broke open and grew; the skin of an insect erupting from the core of the clown’s old form. Like it was shedding.

“Ok, time to go…” Diana whispered in horror as she grabbed Karmen’s hand; Karmen who was staring at the transforming body in front of her in what could only be described as pure terror. Becca briefly caught a glimpse of wings erupting from its back as what looked to be a massive, person-sized wasp erupted from him.

It twitched like a bug. It didn’t even fully look real though. It looked like movie magic. The wasps head twitched with a buzz as Becca noticed that the deadened arms and legs of the clown still hung from the belly of the insect. No face though. The rest of it lifted off the ground with the wasps legs extending on the opposing sides of its thorax. The wasp’s mouth twitched as an unnaturally deep version of the clowns voice erupted with various buzzing surrounding the noise. They listened as they turned around and ran.

“ _I’ve been buzzzzzing for this moment…”_

“Karmen…” Becca was sprinting with Mendy and Martin as she heard Diana whispering Karmen’s name to her. Becca turned her head and paused briefly to see Karmen crying and staring up at IT; only taking one shaky step backwards as she seemed nearly paralyzed with fear “Karmen… baby, I know how scared you are of wasps but this isn't real, we have to fucking go... please-”

_“The brats grew up and brought more delicious brats…”_

Becca watched as the others ran towards a collection of buildings. The town of Derry. Civilization. Becca let them run as she stepped back towards Diana and Karmen as Diana looked at her with a desperate pleading look.

“KARMEN GODDAMNIT-”

_“And when I showed them your dead, cold corpse hanging from a rafter Becca? It was more delicious than anyone else on your foul disgusting planet-”_

Karmen finally closed her mouth and pushed backwards, giving into the pull of Diana’s grip. They began sprinting towards Becca and she watched in slow motion as the wasp’s wings began to move and it flew towards the three of them. 

_“I’m so happy that you exist Becca, it was the first thing I plucked from them when they returned…”_

Becca thought back to the fucking phone call. The call she’d had with Richie… 

Richie hadn’t been far from Derry at the time.

The clown was watching.

“FUCK, MOVE” she shouted at Diana and Karmen, chosing to ignore the wasp which rose upwards and dissapeared into the mist.

“ _...because now, hehe… I get to have the meal I’ve deserved since I arrived on this disgusting rock…”_

The wasp dropped from the mist as Diana pulled what looked to be Becca's taser out of her inner jacket pocket. She turned it on with a sharp crackle as she and Karmen never lost momentum in their sprint. They ran and ran. Becca stood like an idiot just praying they’d get to her. The others had long since run off. Probably hadn’t even realized that they hadn’t followed.

“Move, move, move-” Diana was panting as she pulled Karmen forward, nearly tripping over the sidewalk cement as they ran before the wasp dropped from the fog in a massive shadow. 

“KARMEN-” Becca had shouted, but the shout didn’t matter as the wasp’s stinger pierced into Karmen’s shoulder, causing her to fall face forward. 

Diana shrieked as she nearly fell over with Karmen, managing to lift the taser into the limp deadened arm dangling from the wasps lower body. The wasp flinched and let out an inhuman shriek as it shook. The body seemed to grow smaller as it began to shed its form into the clowns. The appendages seemed to fall off with bug goo dripping into puddles onto the ground where it twitched. From that the clown emerged as Diana fell to her knees in desperation, shaking Karmen’s limp form. 

“SH-SHIT… KARMEN, PLEASE FUCKING… WAKE UP” Diana was crying as she pulled Karmen’s body backwards. She was breathing, so she wasn’t dead but… her entire right shoulder looked swollen. Like a wasp sting but… but the stinger was so much bigger that…

Becca tried not to think as she sprinted towards Diana and lifted Karmen’s other arm over her shoulder, helping Diana to drag her body off the road. 

The clown shook again until it took on a bigger form. Blonder. Becca didn’t even need to finish watching to know what it was becoming.

“ _Beccy…”_ cried a desperate voice, and Becca pierced her eyes shut as she kept dragging. She didn’t even know where they were going. She tried to not think. _“Beccy… you didn’t even come visit me before I died…”._

“F-Fuck you Clown…” she ground out, not stopping from pulling with all her might.

“ _Beccy… you left me, your own mother, and replaced me with that comedian and… and that’s how I died… feeling abandoned and betrayed… I never even got to reconcile with you…”_

Becca felt tears slipping as Diana watched her. Her mother’s impersonator was following slowly behind. Like a wolf following wounded prey. IT didn’t even have to try anymore. IT had all the time in the world. Becca sniffled, turning to glare at her mother’s form. 

She was wearing what she’d had at the funeral.

It was something she didn’t like to talk about. Something she’d never told Richie or Eddie. Her mom had passed a year after the events of the comedy club. It was sudden. Car crash. Could have happened to anyone.

Becca had always had a part in her that thought for sure her mom would eventually come to her senses. That she’d go to therapy someday and they could reconcile. That it would never be a ‘mother and daughter’ relationship in the traditional sense (that had been destroyed by Myra’s treatment of her) but that maybe they could have found something. Just, anything to allow for some form of a relationship… but then she was gone, and all that was left was their final conversation. Myra’s parting words and threats and Becca’s inability to forgive. Becca walking away in rage and never looking back. 

In the end it was what it was. Becca felt a lot of regret sure, who wouldn’t? However, she wasn’t going to let this clown make her feel that guilt. 

“You had no one but yourself to blame for that, but you aren’t even you mom, you’re an ugly, pale, disgusting clown with a shitty hairstyle from Super Cuts” Becca whispered at her moms yellowed eyes. Her face contorted into too large a smile as her arm grew into a massive set of claws just erupting from the skin there. 

_“You even sound like that man now... you did this to me Becca… and now, your gonna float for all eternity...”_ It sounded like a fused version of her mom and the clown’s voices and she glared as the three fell forward. Diana collapsed under the weight of the pull, panting and out of breath.

Becca pulled desperately, but now they were trapped in some lawn out of breath and tired. Diana was crying and broken down as she tried to adjust her grip to something more durable but it seemed to be too late as her Mom’s clawed form stepped closer. 

“I’m so, so sorry Diana…” she whispered, looking to her friend who was crying next to her. Diana looked up at her brokenly, nodding her head as if to reassure Becca as she held a hand out to Becca’s own “we couldn’t let you do it alone… Karmen wanted to come, don’t blame yourself…”.

Becca felt herself crying as she stared at it. She tried to erase her own fears, but she knew that it might not work. She couldn’t tell as her Mother stepped closer before freezing momentarily and smiling.

_“Be a good girl and come with me...”_

Diana squeezed her hand as Becca shut her eyes, praying that she’d live so that Richie and Eddie wouldn’t have to find her body on the side of the road. She didn’t know who she’d prayed to. Just hoped that someone would hear, when-

“FUCK OFF”

She lifted her head up to the shout as what looked to be a broken fence post stabbed through her Mom's chest. Becca stared up as IT shook a little and the blood dripped in the wrong direction from the hole that had developed there.

Her mother looked up at her and made eye contact before looking at Karmen.

“ _Y-you could have saved her Beccy…”_

Becca looked at Karmen who was still alive and breathing, but her eyes were squeezed shut as she let out gasps of pain. 

_“You could have saved all of them… no better than anyone else in your pathetic family… you're useless…”_

Then, suddenly the clown (her mother) turned around to look at the person who’d stabbed IT with the post and Becca’s breath hitched.

  
  


_Mendy…_

It was Mendy… she came back for them… she’d _saved_ them.

Becca just stared with her head shaking and it was as if the clown had heard her. It transformed slowly into a weird half mesh of her mother and the clown, big teeth extending from its enlarged skull as drool leaked from its too big mouth.

_“You couldn’t save any of them…”_

And then the gloved hand gripped at Mendy’s head as it slunk away into the fog with her, dragging her from the street as the mist began to clear.

And both the Clown and Mendy were gone.


	4. The Kids Want To Be So Hard... But In My Dream's We're Still Screaming And Running Through The Yard...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WINTER BREAK BOYS, I'm gonna try to have the last chapter out sooner rather than later. Thank you all for embarking on this journey with me. I've had a blast writing this. I know there is still one more, but I just want to say I appreciate all the support and I cannot thank you all enough.
> 
> Love you Loser's, please enjoy!

James and Martin realized quickly that they were alone in this town together. The fog had faded and it looked like (for the time being) the clown was gone. People were now wandering the sidewalks. For the first time since they arrived at Derry, they actually could see other people. 

“HOW DID WE LOSE THEM, DID THEY NOT RUN?”

Martin listened to James yelling as he stared off at the street they’d just run from. They probably looked like crazy people; he did realize that. He could see parents and random community members watching them oddly. He knew how this looked. Some backwards hick town getting random kids yelling and screaming in the middle of the street. He understood it was weird. He couldn’t find it in himself to care though. He felt like the whole fucking town couldn’t be trusted. Even these people (who he knew were real) couldn’t be trusted on the off chance they were being controlled.

“IT SHED ITS SKIN AND TURNED INTO JEFF GOLDBLUM FROM THE FLY, I MEAN WHY THE FUCK DIDN’T THEY RUN, I REFUSE TO GO BACK, I WON’T-”

“JAMES, SHUT THE FUCK UP” he shouted, causing James to quit pacing and to stare at him with narrowed eyes. Martin huffed and took a breath. “We can’t fucking leave them... “.

James snorted and shook his head, scratching his scalp in frustration as his fingers moved through his hair.

“Yeah, we can’t fucking leave them can we…” he let out a deflated laugh as he looked back at Martin, who was breathing heavily and still staring at him “and of course, the one time you want to be brave and go save the day is the moment Mendy is in danger, I understand-”

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean James…” he ground out, glaring at him in confusion as James just shrugged with a deadened expression “it doesn’t mean anything that matters right now Marty, lets just fucking go get them… fuck I cannot believe they didn’t just fucking run-”

He shoved passed Martin who was still staring and confused, but he quickly followed along back the way they had come. The fog was no longer there as they neared closer to the spot they’d fought IT at. It all looked so normal without the nightmare goggles on.

“MARTY, J” 

They both turned their heads to see Diana and Becca both dragging along Karmen’s fallen form. Karmen was shaking and spazzing slightly as they pulled her and Martin quickly began to sprint over to them with James not far behind.

“WHAT HAPPENED, HOLY SHIT-” James shouted as he pushed Diana out of the way and lifted Karmen up himself, Martin quickly pushing past Becca to help him lift Karmen’s legs.

“We were running and… K-Karmen froze… she… Becca tried to help m-me move her but… she…” Diana was shaking as she stared at her partners pained expression; her eyes squeezed shut and her face scrunched in and contorted. The red on her shoulder seemed to be fading; the swelling was going down with each passing second. However, the stab wound on her shoulder from the stinger still remained very much prominent. Much like the shallow cut of Becca’s neck.

Becca hadn’t said a word as she stared at the spot the clown had disappeared. Where IT had taken Mendy. She remained unmoving and in shock as James started moving Karmen off the street, barely hearing him calling her name.

“Becca”

She looked over at the four of them, her eyes glazed over and her expression torn. 

“Bec, where’s Mendy…”

Becca just stared and shook her head, covering her mouth with her hands as it all fully hit her that the clown had taken her. She couldn’t even open her mouth to speak. That seemed to be answer enough for the four of them as Martin’s eyes got wide with panic.

“No… no way, she was with us, how did… what the fuck happened” Martin demanded, but James shook his head at him to try and get him to stop “J, now isn’t the time… Karmen is over here looking worse than death, we cannot think about it right now- Becca, I know you wanted to keep this secret but we need your parents right now, I don’t know if a hospital can help her…”

“S-She looked better… I think t-the sting was in her head a-and when the clown left it… it started to heal…”

James nodded, readjusting his grip on Karmen as they began to walk, leaving Diana to pull desperately at Becca’s arm.

  
“We’ll find Mendy… we will… but we need to put Karmen somewhere safe first; Bec, where were your parents staying-”

Becca looked at them with red eyes and wet streaks down her cheeks as she finally clicked back into her headspace, walking over to them.

“I-I don’t know but… my Uncle used to work at the Derry library so… I think we should go there and get the gun set up… I don’t think they’ll be there, so we can use it as a base of operations” James nodded again, taking the command and leaving everyone to sprint after him. They walked for about fifteen minutes all the while Diana was reading off turning points on her phone. Derry townspeople were staring at them. They realized how it must look. They tried not to think too hard about it.

They eventually found the library and burst in through the front doors. No one was here from the looks of it, and they wasted no time in placing Karmen on her back, Diana desperately running to go find pillows or blankets to rest her on. 

Karmen was still pale and clammy. Her expression was less pained and more just tired, but she still let out small noises of discomfort from time to time. She looked dead to the world. Her shoulder was still bleeding but it no longer seemed swollen. Becca pushed her hair off of her forehead in a desperate attempt to feel for any fever.

“Here, I found these, put these under her-” Diana whispered to her before a loud voice cut her off “Who the hell are you…?”

They all whipped their heads around to look at the man who’d spoken. It took less than two seconds for all of them to realize it was Becca’s Uncle Mike.

Becca didn’t even hesitate as she sprinted towards him.

“Mike” she sobbed, jumping into his arms and hugging him tightly as he held her in shock. He quickly wrapped his arms around her, placing a hand on her bloodied hair. “Jesus… Becca?”

“Mike, I’m so sorry I just…” she sobbed a little harder as her friends all stared at them. Mike looked up at the group with a nervous expression. He just held her as she broke down in his arms. “Becca… this is… how did you get here?”

“She coerced us into coming to help protect you, and I will have you know that my legal team will be involved” James said sarcastically, but he didn’t laugh. No one did as they surrounded Karmen. Mike released Becca in order to make his way over to Karmen’s still form.

“You shouldn’t be here… none of you should but… I guess it doesn’t matter how you got here… you’re here so we’re in this together for the time being… tell me what happened?”

They explained in a fastly spoken fashion. Rambling at a mile a minute as they desperately tried to explain not only the wasp debacle, but also what the fuck Silent Hill was.

“Soo… a big man came after you-”

“PYRAMID HEAD, YES-”

Mike just blinked “Right… ok, so… Pyramid Head turned into a giant wasp and then proceeded to sting…” he froze his speech as he knelt down over the young girl, feeling her forehead for a fever “this girl-”

“Karmen”

Everyone turned to look at the source of the voice; where Diana was holding her own arms tightly, keeping her expression carefully contained. 

“Her name is Karmen…” she whispered brokenly, covering her forehead with her hand as Mike nodded at her, making eye contact before turning back to Karmen in concern “right… Karmen, she’s going to be ok, I promise you that… her injury is real but the pain from the sting is all in her head… we just have to wait it out for IT’s hold on her to dissipate…”

“So you’re suggesting that we just let her roll around in pain like that until it goes away on its own, what the fuck-” Diana growled, but Mike rose back up to stand in front of Diana, looking at her with a sympathethic expression “its the best we can do… I’m sorry, but she _will be_ ok…”

Diana seemed to accept this, aggressively wiping her cheeks as she breathed in deeply and nodded at him.

“Ok… whatever… I trust you… you’re not a murderous clown so-” she laughed briefly before she froze and looked at Becca, who seemed to still be stuck in her own head as she stared blankly at the wall where she was seated “our friend… shit, our friend Mendy was taken-”

Mike’s eyes shot up at Diana before he turned to look at Becca who seemed to smile bitterly at that, her eyes welled up with tears.

“Becca…” Mike whispered as he began to step towards her. She looked up at him and shrugged.

“Mendy… she saved our lives… we couldn’t… we were trying to help Karmen and it… IT took her Mike” she whispered as Mike’s expression turned sympathetic. He stepped towards her but she rose a hand up to stop him. “It’s fine Uncle Mike… this was my fault but… I cannot accept that she’s dead, I mean, you all told me Aunt Bev was taken and she-”

“Bec-”

“No, shut up, Aunt Bev survived, so if IT didn’t kill her, maybe IT also didn’t kill Mendy, I mean… it's possible-”

“Beccy…” Mike whispered to her, but she kept shaking her head as she glared at her uncle, eyes shooting up at him as she gestured strongly “SHE COULD STILL BE DOWN THERE”.

There was a long moment of silence as everyone in the Library got quiet. Mike let out a long exhale as the rest of the group watched the interaction awkwardly. Eventually though, Martin rose a hand up.

“Um… if there is a chance that Mendy is still alive I want to go find her-” 

Mike looked a step away from arguing before another voice jumped in.

“Yeah, we can’t just abandon her; even if it's just a small chance, we have to take it right?”

That voice was James, which came as a shock to Becca as she stared at them all. Diana quickly jumped in too.

“Yeah, we’ve come this far… Karmen wouldn’t forgive us if we just left Mendy for dead- Mike, where would IT have taken her-”

Mike rubbed his forehead; strained and clearly stressed.

“Ok, no… no, you shouldn't even be here, we’re not discussing this-”

“Uncle Mike-”

“NO BECCA, DO YOU EVEN KNOW HOW MUCH OF A _PANIC_ THIS IS GONNA SEND RICHIE AND YOUR DAD INTO- I CANNOT LET YOU LEAVE THIS LIBRARY-”

“I wasn’t asking that” Becca whispered, her hands raised awkwardly to try and bring Mike back down from his own panic “you’re right, we tried this on our own and IT knew who I was like… almost immediately, so we’ve been improvising ever since-” Mike got confused as he glanced at Becca again with narrowed eyes “wait, IT knew you?”

Becca got confused for a second before nodding furiously as Mike’s eyebrows furrowed.

“Um… uh, yeah, we were driving into Derry and we were hoping to… I don’t know, sneak up on it while IT was distracted with you guys, aaaand… IT placed a red balloon on the welcome to Derry sign and IT told me IT knew me, like IT said my name and mentioned my dads” Mike’s eyes got big as he stared at her, shaking his head and nodding suddenly as he thought it all through “to be honest, if you had more information your plan may have worked… IT knew you because IT can see memories and thoughts to an extent… IT has to be, everything you see of IT is in the mind so…”.

Becca nodded carefully as Mike seemed to understand, turning to Becca.

  
“You didn’t think IT would know who you were so you thought you could help and… I understand that… but Becca, you being here makes everything so much more complicated…” Mike whispered and Becca just nodded again, feeling that guilt coming back up but refusing to sit on the emotion.

“Then… shit, we’ll just have to try-”

“BECCA-”

She heard the shout from her friends very suddenly as she gestured towards a slam. She turned her head to see a man off in the darkened side of the Library. She had no idea how long he had been there.

“Uncle Mike, is that…?”

She pointed slowly as Mike turned around, but it only took a second before the man was charging forwards towards Mike. Everyone went into a panic immediately. He tumbled onto Mike’s form with a knife in hand, attempting to stab him and Becca’s mind went blank as she swerved to move around them. She heard Diana shouting something as Becca moved forward and tried to yank at the man's right arm. It seemed to be just distracting enough to steer him away from his goal of murder, but in the same moment, she heard the slice before she felt it. 

The cut had landed on her upper forearm, and she immediately stumbled back in shock. The man just continued back on his mission as she felt herself falling back onto James while Martin sprinted to try and pull the stranger off of Mike.

“YOU HEAR THAT MIKE-”

It was the man. Becca stared at him as James stripped off his second layer to hold on Becca’s arm. She felt him whisper something on the side of her head before running to attempt to help Martin. Becca stared as they managed to reel him off, pulling violently as they all fell backwards in a massive stumble. Becca thought quickly and sprinted over to Diana, letting the shirt she’d received drop to the ground and finding that Diana had been one step ahead of her as she held out a partially opened box. 

Becca didn’t think. She hoped the dumb fuck would fall for it. The fucking handgun wasn’t loaded but…

She pulled out the gun just as the man began slashing wildly to get the two younger boys away from him. Martin and James stepped back nervously in an attempt to not get hit while Mike tried to lift himself off the ground from his daze.

Becca let out a calm breath before pointing the gun at the man.

“YOU BETTER FUCKING DROP THAT KNIFE RIGHT NOW YOU UGLY PIECE OF GARBAGE, FUCKIN’ ACHEY BREAKY HEART LOOKING FUCK” she shouted loudly, keeping the gun even as she held it as professionally as she could. She’d played Battlefield in the past, and while she knew it wasn’t perfectly accurate, she hoped it would be accurate enough to trick the dumb fuck. The man let out a crazed laugh as he stilled, making eye contact with her.

“I have to finish this…. It’s their time-”

“The only time it is for you is time for a haircut, but considering that we’re in the 2010’s? I’m going to assume you _know_ that the haircut isn’t working and you just don’t care, now... DROP. THE. KNIFE-”

“Becca holy shit, is that a gun” she heard Mike whisper anxiously but she didn’t have time to explain, especially without giving away the secret “I’m licensed to carry Mike, I practice, you know that…”.

Mike seemed to get the hint pretty quickly and nodded “You’re right, how could I forget” he whispered in a rigid voice, getting his bearings and standing as he stared across at the man who’d made his life a living hell for so long. 

“You’re Henry Bowers… you bullied my family” she whispered, holding the gun a little tighter as she felt her palms sweating. Henry cocked his head and glanced at her curiously.

“Heh… he’s got plans for you… what a pleasant surprise you are… tell me, do you miss your little girlfriend-”

Becca felt her gaze harden and for just a brief moment, she desperately wished she had ammo to shoot.

“You’re in Derry now sweetheart… don’t you know” he muttered, smiling viciously as she narrowed her eyes.

“Know what, trailer trash?”

“Don’t you know what happens to _fags_ in this town-”

It was the brief moment of hesitation and he was charging right at her and Mike. He knew. He knew she couldn’t use the gun.

She closed her eyes quickly, squeezing them shut. She felt Mike pushing her behind him but she knew an impact would still occur right before-

Right before she heard a disgusting slice and the impact never came.

She opened her eyes slowly, one at a time before she watched Bowers eyes roll to the back of his head as he slumped to the ground. She felt herself crying when she saw him.

“R-Richie…?”

Richie looked at her in shock, looking between both her and Mike as he looked back down at where he’d put the hatchet in Bowers. Mike stared at him, breathing heavily as they adjusted to what had happened. Richie looked back up awkwardly as he stared at Becca.

“Well I was going to make a bad joke right here about overdue books, but now I’m more concerned with _WHAT THE FUCK you are doing here-_ ” Richie mumbled, stepping up to Mike and briefly giving him a once over to make sure he was ok before turning to Becca “what the fuck, are you bleeding?”

“I-I’m fine dad…” she said it softly, an almost relieved smile on her face as she lowered the unloaded gun and immediately hugged Richie “I’m sorry…”.

“Sweetheart…” he whispered softly, hugging her back. Mike just gave a small smile.

“They came here after arriving in Derry… IT knew who they were from the minute they arrived” Mike whispered to him but Richie didn’t seem to be comprehending words as he held Becca tighter, feeling blood staining his clothes but not finding it in himself to care. He pulled back to glare at her.

“I thought I told you not to get involved-”

“We weren’t, we never had a chance to not get involved-”

“Becca, a “NOT INVOLVED” person would not have a fucking gun which, thinking about that… HOW THE FUCK DID YOU PURCHASE THAT BY THE WAY-” Richie shrieked, pulling back to pull the gun from her limp hand before narrowing his eyes at it. Becca tried to continue “I just… wanted to help you and when the clown attacked us, I thought ‘hey, you know what I believe can kill things? A goddamn handgun’ so we went to the store and I… used my fake ID?”

Richie’s eyes went wide as he pointed an accusing finger “I FUCKING KNEW YOU HAD A FAKE ID, YOU CONNIVING LITTLE SHIT, I TOLD YOU THAT YOU WERE A FUCKING SLYTHERIN-”

“Yeah, I’m honestly surprised he sold it to me, he… the gun store guy didn’t seem very attentive-”

“Yeah, no one in this fucking town is goddamn fucking attentive Bec, I’m not shocked you were able to get your hands on this… fuck me Beccy, what the fuck are we gonna tell your dad-” and not a moment later, Eddie dropped the backpack he was carrying, staring dead at Richie and Becca conversing.

“WHAT THE FUCK-”

Welp, guess they were about to find out…

Becca stared awkwardly at Eddie, giving a half hearted wave with her uninjured hand as she lifted the fallen shirt back up and regained a pressure on the wound on her arm. Richie went a different direction, and proceeded to just lean right, gag a moment, before wandering off to throw up.

“BECCA, WHAT THE FUCK-” Eddie was pacing towards her and she backed up and held up an awkward hand in defense “I CAN EXPLAIN-”.

“OH THAT’LL BE INTERESTING- RICHIE, QUIT VOMITING, SHE’S GOING TO EXPLAIN, THIS SHOULD BE GOOD-”

Becca thought for a moment, gazed on the ceiling before she gave a small grin and shrugged.

“Uhhh… you just got pranked?”

She flinched as soon as Eddie’s face contorted in anger.

“Ooooh, I am going to ground you till the grave if we don’t fucking die, holy shit… RICHIE, DID YOU KNOW ABOUT THIS?”

Richie held up a finger as he attempted to recover from throwing up; Eddie just rolled his eyes “yeah, if your throwing up, you fucking knew about this you guilty piece of shit-”

The other Loser’s began to pile in after Eddie, all of them confused and staring as Eddie screamed. Bev jumped a little at the corpse on the floor while Eddie seemed hellbent to ignore it as he lost is shit entirely.

“Uh, is now a good time to ask about the…” she pointed awkwardly to her own cheek to get her point across but that seemed to make Eddie angrier “YOU’RE ASKING ME ABOUT _MY_ CHEEK WHEN YOU HAVE FUCKING MULTIPLE _OPEN_ AND _BLEEDING WOUND’S_ BECCA, ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME, HAVE YOU _AT LEAST_ STERALIZED IT-?”

“Ed’s oh shit… what did happen to your-”

“YOU SHUT THE FUCK UP, OUR DAUGHTER IS FUCKING BLEEDING OUT IN THIS SHITTY FUCKING CLOWN TOWN, YOU DO NOT ASK ABOUT MY FUCKING CHEEK” Eddie shouted, and Richie made an expression that basically just said ‘fair enough’ and proceeded to hobble off to the side as Eddie looked at Becca, grabbing her arm from her grip and examining the wound “shit… its deep, might need stitches-”

“It just happened… Bower’s was gonna kill Uncle Mike…” she whispered absently, letting Eddie wipe away at the wound. Mike seemed to be looking for first-aid as he desperately shoveled through drawers outside of Becca’s vision.

“That isn’t shocking, he just got done stabbing me… we came here to make sure he _hadn’t_ killed Mike” Eddie responded and Becca’s own eyes went wide “IS THAT WHAT THAT FUCKING IS? YOU GOT STABBED IN THE CHEEK-”

“OH MY GOD BECCA, YOU ARE SO POT CALLED THE KETTLE BLACK, YOU DON’T GET TO-” Eddie didn’t get to finish as Becca’s eyes went wide and she took a breath in preparation to shriek “FUCK YOU ‘I DON’T GET TO’ YOU BOOMER ASS, I AM ONLY HERE BECAUSE YOU ARE ALL SACRIFICIAL AND DUMB, AND I WAS SCARED IF I DIDN’T I’D BE A FUCKING ORPHAN-”

Richie and Mike stared at the screaming match; Mike looking slightly horrified and Richie just grinning absently as the two seemed to attempt a competition of ‘who was more loud’ and they were both winning.

“YOU’RE SUCH A LITTLE BRAT BECCA, WHAT THE FUCK- DO YOU KNOW HOW MANY TIMES THAT CLOWN HAS USED YOU TO FUCK WITH ME TODAY-”

“NEWSFLASH DAD, THE SECOND I GOT HERE HE KNEW WHO I WAS BECAUSE _YOU-_ ” she jabbed her finger into Eddie’s chest to get her point across “ _YOU_ FUCKING THINK TOO LOUDLY”.

Richie popped in to attempt to interject, opening his mouth and raising his hand in gesture before Eddie and Becca both shouted a quick “NO” at him, almost simultaneously as Richie shrugged and backed up again.

“You need to go home Becca, I don’t know how the fuck you got here, but I’ll set up a flight or something, I don’t fucking care, you cannot be here” Eddie finally said at a normal room level, and Becca’s nostrils flared as she stared him down “No…”.

Eddie’s eyebrows raised right before the anger erupted on his face “FUCK YOU WITH THE FUCKING ‘NO’, I’M YOUR DAD BECCA, AND IF YOU LISTEN TO ME ON NOTHING ELSE, YOU WILL LISTEN TO ME ON THIS-”.

“You and Richie have both told me I’m a brave kid, that I’m willing to go the distance… you have always been so supportive, you even let me tell my asshole mom to fuck off before she…” Becca got quiet as Eddie’s face seemed to turn to an expression of understanding. He tried to interrupt “Becca…”.

“No, wait just…” Becca felt herself pushing her arm out of Eddie’s grip as she looked at all of them “I’m here… please just let me help, I don’t even think I could get out of Derry without the clown coming for me now, just… I know you think I’m small and weak, and I know you’ve both tried to protect me from all of this but I’m agreeing with you guys… I am brave, I managed to hold off Bowers with an unloaded handgun, and I stabbed the clown when it first attacked our car-”

“FIRST ATTACKED-”

“DAD-” She interrupted his interruption before continuing “You guys have told me that I’m brave, that I can do all kinds of shit and… and I want to do this so… so if you all get to protect your family? If you all get that choice, then so do I”.

The room got quiet as Ben and Beverly stared at her. Eddie was breathing loudly but he looked less angry as he glanced over at Richie.

“You let her go because you knew you couldn’t stop her, didn’t you?”

Richie’s eyes got wide behind his glasses and he gave a quick nod as Eddie let out a long exhale; pinching the bridge of his nose “Fuck…”.

Becca’s eyes widened as he looked back at her, speaking softly “I hate this… I hate that you’re here but… you’re right, it would be more dangerous to make you leave, and we don’t even know where Bill and Stan are right now-”

“We lost Mendy… my- shit, I mean our friend” Eddie stared at her as the words spilled out of her mouth before his eyes got wide “Shit… Becca?”

“Yeah… that Mendy…” 

Richie stared at her in shock as well, remembering a year back when a crying Becca had come to them about a crush. Her first crush. They remembered the name falling out of her mouth in those moments between crying and breaths, and Richie couldn't help taking a few cautious steps towards her as Eddie put a hand over his mouth in shock. Becca felt the pressure of Richie hugging her before she saw it, but she felt so numb mentioning Mendy’s name that it barely felt like anything. The only words she could think of was _my fault._ Just like her Mom… maybe if she’d _tried_. Maybe if she’d put in more effort. Now she’d never get the chance for anything. Just like the loss of the potential for recovery in her and her Mom’s damaged relationship... she’d have to live the rest of her life just wondering… all the while knowing that it was _because of her._

“I-I dragged everyone here… I was so desperate t-to help and so scared I-I… I’m just like my fucking mom aren’t I, I screwed up and tried to force everybody into this and now... now-”

Eddie didn’t even let her finish as he walked up to her front and hugged both her and Richie tightly. She felt Richie’s grasp squeeze her tighter as well. She felt tears building but she tried desperately not to let them fall as her own friends walked over, joining them.

“Becca, we asked to come, we told you we didn’t want you to come alone” Diana whispered, and James nodded beside her, “yeah, I didn’t even believe you… you warned us so many times and I was an asshole about it but… I don’t regret coming Beccy… because now that I see what this is, I would have hated myself if I’d let you come alone-”

“Yeah I mean, we’re your friends Trashmouth, come on…”

She grinned a bit at the old joke name, attempting to glare up at Marty but it just came out as a smile "don’t whip out that shitty fucking nickname in a touching moment you bitch, come on-”

Eddie pulled away slightly to put a hand on Becca’s shoulder, making her look up at him “Becca, you are nothing like your mom and I know how tough her accident must have been for you but NONE of this is on you Becca… the world doesn’t hang on your shoulders and I’m so sorry if I ever made you feel like it did…”.

Becca smiled wetly at him and Eddie just hugged her again, as if to reaffirm his own words. Becca nodded slowly as Eddie moved in to kiss her forehead as she cried.

“Oh hello Becca, I see you snuck out to Derry then” Stan said dryly as she looked over at him and grinned “UNCLE STAN-”

“Nope, you will not 'Uncle Stan' me right after being a moron, I told you I didn’t want you to come here-” her eyes seemed to flash as she glared at him “MY DADS HAD TO TALK YOU DOWN FROM GAME ENDING YOURSELF, OF COURSE I CAME-”

“Ok, that’s enough guys… we have the tokens… we just need to find Bill and we can finish this…” Mike whispered, nodding at the collection of people, who all seemed to be in agreement as a small voice joined the collection “ooh boy, I finally get a round two with the clown…?”

Becca and the group turned their heads to see Karmen’s eyes were open and she was grinning up at them. Diana seemed to be the first to react as she lept down and kissed her.

“You absolute” _kiss_ “bitch” _kiss_ “I thought” _another kiss_ “you were fucking dead” Karmen seemed to find the action amusing as she rested her hand in Diana's hair, whispering “you cannot kill a bad bitch”.

Diana grinned at her response just as the phone rang within the room. It seemed to be Mike’s and he walked away to answer. Becca looked back at Richie and Eddie “Hey, I just wanted to say that I’m also sorry… you know for sneaking back to Derry like I did… you all were so brave to come back here and… and Stan, I’m sorry to you too but you don’t know how scared I got when I heard that…”.

Stan nodded at her, giving her a small pat on the shoulder “I’m sorry that I scared you Beccy, I just… I got hit with the urge so fast but... thinking of all of you? I-It helped…”.

“So, when are we going to get Mendy” Martin asked them, and everyone stared just as Mike interrupted “FUCK… Bill’s trying to fight IT alone… we have to do this now-”

Becca nodded up at Stan, looking back at both Richie and Eddie for a sort of permission. Her eyes were begging and Eddie and Richie just looked at each other before Eddie nodded for them.

“I’m not gonna stop you Becca, I know how bad you want to save her… you won't be able to help us with the ritual but you can go find her, in fact… BEN-” his head shot up as he looked between them, stepping closer “we can throw your token in the fire and you can catch up, but please make sure Becca doesn’t get herself killed-”

“OH _COME ON,_ I DON’T NEED A CHAPERONE” Becca yelled but Eddie gave her a side-eyed glare as he muttered “clearly you do, and you’re lucky I am allowing this _at all_ so… Ben, do you mind helping her?”

Ben ruffled her hair as he grinned down at her “yeah I can do that… I already have a feeling that I know where he left her if she is still alive…”

“Ok, so then it's settled, is everybody ready-” Eddie whispered, seeing a collection of nods before Becca yelled out “WAIT-”

She ran towards Richie, grabbing the gun out of his hands and sprinting back to the group.

“Does anybody know how to load this”?


	5. It's Already Passed...

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry ya'll. Lowkey, I've been not in the right mindset to write lately. I really lost the passion I had for the fic when I started, but I wanted to finish this fic for you guys. I didn't want to be that guy who leaves it unfinished. I hadn't really wanted to write recently, and I've been insanely busy with my IRL projects. Either way, I did finally finish it. Sorry it took so long and all. 
> 
> Love ya'll, thanks for all the support <3

Mendy opened her eyes gently as she realized she was laying comatose on a collection of stones. Her nerves jumped as she looked around to only hear the trickle of sewer water and a proceeding darkness to surround that. She lifted herself onto her elbows as she examined her surroundings, her heart hammering out of her chest.

“Bec…” she whispered softly, confused as to when she’d been taken from the streets “Marty…”.

No one answered. Not even the laugh of the clown. 

Everything felt so hazy. Dreamlike. She lifted her body but her body almost didn’t feel real. Was she dead? Was this Hell? She tried not to think about it too hard as she trekked forward, stepping towards the only mild lightsource she could find. She took three more steps, touched a piece of stone on the wall, when suddenly the world flashed light. She tried to mask the brightness with a hand, but nothing could drown out the vision of it. She vaguely heard children laughing. High-pitched. Almost fake sounding.

“You’re not real…” she whispered weakly to it, and the laughter immediately died. She felt victorious for about a moment before the overwhelming brightness slipped away like a curtain closing the stage. She was surrounded by pitch black. Nothingness was surrounding her. She didn’t know if this was a trick, or if she was just dead.

“Hello…?”

An answering vision blasted into her eyes as she watched Becca’s family standing in an ancient cavern. Everything came in flashes. She watched them chanting. She watched a balloon emerge. She watched them run from a deformed spider pretending to be a clown. Eventually, through a haze of emotions, she watched Becca’s dad die. 

She couldn’t blink. Couldn’t look away from her vision as she watched. She didn’t know how much time had passed. She watched Becca’s step dad yelling at Becca’s father: at Eddie. She watched him desperately beg for him to open his eyes.

She watched him as he was dragged away from him.

She desperately tried to speak. Panicking slightly as she tried to yell for help. She didn’t know where the rest of their group was. Where Becca was. Maybe they had already escaped? Maybe they were dead. Maybe none of this mattered because Mendy herself was already dead.

She felt the prison of visions slip away though as she fell forward back into darkness, still not feeling her body despite seeing herself.

That’s when the  _ eye _ appeared before her.

_ I have shown you what I can. The rest is up to you, child. _

In what felt like the distorted thought of a fever dream, she could have sworn the eye of the voice speaking in her head looked like a turtle's. 

She didn’t have time to investigate the thought though as the eye blinked and dissipated. Her eyes were finally released as she was allowed to blink, and when she opened them again, she saw her friends staring back up at her. All of them. 

“B-Bec… Mart… Marty… holy fuck all of you, y-you’re here-”

She was cut off as they yanked her into a hug. All of them. She felt wetness on her neck and couldn’t tell if it was from them crying on her or if it was the wet of the sewer.

“W-We thought you were fucking  _ dead _ , holy shit Mendy your alive…” Becca cried onto her, which answered her monologue, and she looked past the pile of her friends to see one of Becca’s relatives, one of the ones from her vision.  _ Ben _ , she vaguely thought. Her Uncle. He was staring at Becca with a sort of fond smile before he dropped back into a stoic expression and tapped Becca’s shoulder.

“Ok sweetie, we found your friend, and you woke her up, but now you gotta go… take the gun with you in case IT comes after you and get as far away from Derry as you can, ok?” 

Ben was speaking to Becca, who was nodding and still clutching onto Mendy’s right side. Marty had pulled away to look Mendy over.

“Mendy, hey… we uh… we gotta go, but your awake, which is what matters-”

“Marty kissed you awake…” Becca whispered to her, to which Mendy’s eyebrows furrowed in confusion “Uncle Ben told us that he kissed my Aunt Bev to wake her up so… he told us that might work for you and…” she gestured vaguely to Marty, who stared at Becca with his mouth agape, like he was confused by that knowledge. Mendy just stared vaguely at Marty.

She knew Marty had liked her for a long time but… 

Was it the power of his crush that woke her up? If so, why was he so shocked. She felt sick to her stomach as she lurched on her side. Marty was her best friend but she knew she didn’t like him in that way.

Her eyes met Becca’s as she absorbed the information.

“Guys, this is… Becca, we’re talking later by the way, but guys, I have to go down there and meet up with the others, which means all of you need to go…” her Uncle quickly kissed Becca’s hair before standing back up and walking towards the hole in the center of the room. She shook her head, still unable to find words. Marty and James held her out of the water as Becca held onto her hand.

“They’re gonna go kill the clown, and we have to get you out of this sewer, ok Mendy, we’re gonna carry you, just… just hold on-”

“No, Beccy-”

She gripped Becca’s hand tighter, flinching slightly as the memories of her visions flooded back to her.

“Bec, no, we… we gotta… fuck, we gotta go down there, we gotta-” Becca placed her other hand on Mendy’s neck, causing her pulse to jump but she ignored it to get out her warning “we gotta save your Dad Bec, IT’s gonna kill your dad-”

Becca stared at her, shaking her head with her mouth hanging open, before she clenched it tightly, her eyes narrowing in determination.

“Fuck ok then… I’m gonna go kill that fucking clown then” she whispered, looking back to see that Ben had already descended.

“I saw it happen in… in a vision. He gets stabbed. He thinks he killed IT and he… IT stabs him from behind, you have to hurry-”

Becca nodded, squeezing Mendy’s hand tightly and bringing her hand to her lips, kissing it lightly before nodding. Mendy stared at the gesture, smiling a little as James and Marty (the only two in the group who seemingly were there) helped her sit up.

“Marty, James, you two get her back to the Library with Diana and Karmen, ok? You guys have done enough, just… leave this to me-”

“Bullshit Beccy, I’m not letting you go down there alone” James shrieked but Becca gave him a calming look “Jay, I won’t be alone. My family is down there. I promise, things are gonna be fine, she needs you more than I do” she gestured to Mendy gently, and James looked on the verge of arguing before Marty bopped his shoulder, pulling Mendy up with him.

“Dude, we gotta go-” he whispered, lifting up Mendy’s limp form as James glared a moment longer. He eventually closed his eyes, exhaling in frustration before pulling Becca into a tight hug.

“Fucking survive Becca, you hear me” he muttered into her ear, and Becca nodded slowly, hugging him back. James only pulled away somewhat to look Becca in the eye and whisper softly “and tell Mendy the fucking truth when this is over…”

Becca stared and felt her heart halt a moment, but James was already turning to help Mendy out, lifting her legs to help Marty pull her out of the sewers. She watched them leave, turning around silently in the darkened room. There were years and years worth of things trapped in the watery prison. Once owned by victims of the clown. She walked slowly through the grime to the hole her Uncle had gone down. She climbed up onto the plank of wood it rested on, hearing vague laughter in the distance. She decided not to fall for it though as she climbed into the hole and dropped in.

It was a distance down. She held onto the rocks firmly as she worked her way into the chasm, the gun slipped into the hem of her jeans. Her arm ached as she climbed down, but she tried not to think of the raw pain as she moved. Thinking instead of what she needed to do.

She reached the bottom, walking forward towards the direction that she could hear noise. It was vague, yelling and large shuffling, and she could hear Bev and Ben yelling at each other. Her heart stopped. Were they being killed?

She pulled the gun out of her pant leg and trekked on. She pulled the safety off, the gun itself having been loaded by Mike. She remembered the small lesson on gun safety he gave her as she marched towards death itself.

The light got brighter ever so slightly. She kept her hesitant steps forward as she marched on. She froze though when her mother's shrill voice came from behind.

“You could have saved me Beccy… you could have at least reached out” her mom whispered. It wasn’t threatening and it wasn’t angry. She turned around to see her mother staring at her just… sadly. She looked defeated. She looked  _ betrayed. _ Becca had to fight off the wave of self-loathing that hit her when she saw her mother's face.

“I wasn’t ready… I was… I was  _ scared of you _ -”

“You could have at least tried… maybe I wouldn’t be dead if you had just-”

Her mother’s voice was cut off by a gunshot. The shot came from Becca’s hand, shaking slightly but not missing her mark. She watched with tears in her eyes as her mom slouched down in visible pain, whispering “Beccy…” before melting into the water of the cavern. Becca exhaled softly, lowering the gun.

“I’m sorry Mom… I love you” she whispered to no one as she turned around and walked forward, more sure of herself as she moved towards the noises.

She could see them all staring at the clown. It looked like a massive spider, but fused. Garbled up and mixed with that freak form that IT wears like a suit. She watched the scene unravel. She watched as her Dad ran over to Richie, yelling excitedly, and she sucked in a breath.

_ This was it… this was the moment Mendy had warned her about. _

Her other Dad, Richie was just staring up blankly at Eddie. She took the initiative as she saw the claw begin to rise.

“DAD GET DOWN” she shouted at the stop of her lungs, firing every shot she had at the clown, head and hitting the IT’s claw dead on. Eddie jumped out of pure shock, turning to look at Becca. The clown moved its injured claw back towards its body as it lifted itself off of its spot.

“BECCA WHAT THE HELL-” Eddie yelled, but Becca ignored his angry yelling and moved down from the slightly ledge she’d entered from, stepping towards them.

“Mendy had a vision that IT killed you” she half-spoke, half-shouted. Eddie wanted to argue before Richie pulled him away from the spot, finally out of his daze and yanking Eddie off towards the walls.

“I saw it too, Ed's, she’s right-” he was panting, running and speaking at the same time as Eddie absorbed the information. But the clown was already back up.

_ “Ya shouldn’t have wasted all your bullets Beccy…” _

She ignored the clown, tossing the gun to the side and picking up a rock next to her feet.

“At least I don’t have a receeding harline, you Lord of the Ring’s looking fuck-” she shouted before throwing the rock with all of her strength, smashing into IT’s body and, suprisingly, knocking him over. Eddie, and Richie seemed to be having an existential boomer moment, so she moved towards her aunts and uncles.

She waited for it to attack again, but it surprisingly seemed wounded. She stared in confusion. It couldn’t have been from the rock right?

“God your ugly, and your house smells like shit, what's wrong? Are you done attacking me because I shit on your dandruff-riddled hair? Bitch, maybe if you didn’t live in a sewer you could pick up some Head and Shoulders” she felt bolder as she watched it flinch, and suddenly, she heard her dad rambling.

“Fuck, she’s right, Becca’s right, YEAH, OUT OF EVERY FORM YOU CAN CHOSE FROM, WHY DO YOU CHOSE THAT ONE, YOUR SPIDER FORM ISN’T EVEN ORIGINAL, I SAW MORE CREATIVE IDEAS FOR SPIDER FORMS IN THE HARRY POTTER FRANCHISE-”

Pennywise said nothing, just muttered to itself as the other Loser’s caught on.

“YEAH, YOU’RE JUST A FUCKING BULLY, WASTE OF SPACE CLOWN-”

It kept going. They kept trading insults. Chanting clown. Becca watched them do it. This wasn’t her moment. She just felt her chest relax as she watched her family corner the clown. 

It was over soon after.

She heard them crush its heart. She watched as the alien stone surrounding the cave began to crumble. She tried to grab a drifting piece, but it dissolved in her hand. 

“Becca, we gotta go-” her dad was grabbing her arm, Richie not far behind him. She looked up to see the cavern was collapsing “fucking MOVE Beccy, come on-”

She was being pulled but she couldn’t help but smile. It was over. Her family was alive. She could barely even hear her dad ranting at her through her joy.

“I swear to god, I do not care if your going to college soon and you won’t be living under our roof, I will find a way to punish you, rest assured you stupid fucking idiot-”

Becca had never grinned wider.

She climbed up and out of the cavern. They ran through the house. As soon as they were outside of Neibolt, Eddie collapsed in the yard, pulling her down with him. She was laughing like a maniac.

“Nothings gonna be funny when I DELETE your xbox live account you little brat, I swear to god-”

“I’m so happy your alive” she cried, pulling her Dad into a hug and silencing him completely. He finally gave in, hugging her back and whispering “jesus, Beccy… I’m glad you're alive too…”

She felt Richie hugging them and grinned wider, crying a little as she heard her friend rushing over.

“HOLY FUCK YOUR ALIVE-”

“BECCA, JESUS, THE WHOLE THING COLLAPSED”

In the midst of the celebration, Becca didn’t see Mendy who was staring blankly at her. Mendy turned to look at Marty, who was smiling from the ecstacy of having won.

“Did you really kiss me Marty…” she asked him, and he looked at her and blushed slightly before his smile fell into a saddened frown “oh uh… I did but… Mendy, when I kissed you it didn’t work…”

Mendy watched him carefully as he turned to look back at Becca, continuing the conversation but not maintaining the eye contact.

“Becca kissed you after me. She was… she was in a panic. I was hyperventilating because I thought you were dead, but then Becca kissed you and you just… woke up”

Mendy absorbed the information. Becca? Her Becca? The one who has never given her a signal of interest? Or had she just not been paying attention.

“But you like me don’t you? Why would it work for Becca and not for you…?”

Marty smiled sadly at her, finally looking back at Mendy and putting a hand gently on her shoulder.

“Mendy… I have a feeling that you already know why it worked for Becca and not for me…”

Mendy stared onward, but Marty just gave her a reassuring smile, gently kissing her on the cheek before walking away to the rest of the group.

Everyone was celebrating as Mendy realized what she hadn’t known about herself all along. She had a crush all this time, and she just didn’t know it.

She strutted over to where the group was piled, hugging Becca tightly from behind as Becca jumped in shock.

“Mendy, hey-”

“So, you totally lied to me about Marty, and I know the truth....” she whispered, and Becca looked at her with a startled, almost sick looking expression.

“Mendy, I’m so sorry, I just… I thought you liked Martin, so I just-” Becca was cut off by the quick peck Mendy gave her, a hand on the back of her head as she blushed profusely, the rest of the Loser’s lost in their own world.

Mendy pulled back, looking up at Becca intensely.

“Bec, I know you were thinking of going to Florida, and if it's your dream, I don’t want to stop you, but if you don’t mind, I really wanna try dating you, if thats ok, and if Florida isn’t your dream, you should stay in California with me, or fuck it, just come with me to Valencia… what do you say…”

Becca smiled excitedly at her, kissing her gently one last time before nodding.

“Ok…”

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  



End file.
